Democracy 1: Democracy's Right (26 page)

Her eyes opened in wonder.  Could it be, she asked herself, that the Roosevelt Family was overextended?  The Thousand Families prided themselves on their long-term view, investing early in new sectors, planets and industries to maintain their position, yet the Roosevelt Family had definitely been going well over the standard pattern.  They’d even forced most of the other Families out of the sector, keeping it all to themselves…why?  To make themselves even more immensely rich than they already were?

Or perhaps because it was their last desperate gamble, one last shot to avert disaster.  The Empire’s economy had been slowly freezing up for centuries, a result of the deadening effects of patronage and bureaucracy.  If the Roosevelt Family was in serious trouble…who knew what might happen to the Empire as a whole?  Families had come and gone before, yet the Roosevelt Family was colossal, with interests everywhere.  Could it be that they were weaker than anyone dared think?

And, she asked herself, what would happen if the rebels kept destroying their investment?

They’d be able to carry on for some years, using their connections and the sheer unlikelihood of the situation to hide the truth, but eventually it would come out…and what would happen then?  She thought about the hundreds of worlds that belonged, directly or indirectly, to the Roosevelt Family, with the trillions of humans and aliens inhabiting them.  What would happen to those helpless lives?  Or, for that matter, what would happen to the remainder of the Empire?  Would the fall of one Family lead to the fall of others?  Or would the remainder of the Families congratulate themselves on having avoided such a fate, pat the Roosevelt Family’s head and buy up all their assets?  Somehow, she doubted that the Families could work together to save the Empire.  They’d be saving it from themselves. 

“It is not a complete disaster,” Brent-Cochrane said.  His voice was calm, very composed, yet Penny could hear an underlying note of delight.  Percival wouldn’t survive the loss of his patrons, not with all the enemies he’d made over the years.  “We do have new options, ones that we lacked before.”

Percival glowered at him.  “And what would those be?”

“We don’t have to worry about preventing the news from spreading,” Brent-Cochrane said.  “So we contact the Sector Commander of Sector 99 – he’s my Uncle, unless he’s been promoted by now – and ask him to send reinforcements.  Even a single additional squadron of superdreadnaughts would be a bonus for us…and he has three squadrons under his command.  We ask him to deploy them here and we make further attacks prohibitively expensive for the rebels.”

Percival’s lips moved, but he said nothing.  Penny could almost read his thoughts; calling in help, even from the nearest sector, would take time…and certainly reinforce the suggestion that Percival was grossly incompetent and also partly responsible for the mutiny.  Coming to think of it, she wondered, what would happen if Sector 99’s Sector Commander turned up and tried to take command?  He might be able to dislodge Percival…and if he really was related to Brent-Cochrane, he might place Percival’s subordinate in his place.

And yet, now the message blackout had been broken, the news
would
be spreading and failing to ask for help would certainly count against him.  And, Penny suspected, Brent-Cochrane would send a message of his own to his uncle, if he hadn’t already.  Percival had to know that too, which meant that he was trapped.  He had to ask for help and hope for the best.  She could almost sense his frustration, boiling off him in waves.  She hoped, with a burst of malice that was almost worthy of Percival himself, that it choked him.

“I will communicate with Sector 99,” Percival said.  She smiled inwardly at his desperation.  The message was racing relentlessly towards Earth.  Six months – no, less than six months now – and the Thousand Families would know just how badly Percival had bungled the rebellion.  A year from now, Percival might receive orders telling him to travel to Earth to be executed, or maybe – if his connections came through – a simple relief from command.  “I want you to find the rebels.”

“We will return to our position and wait,” Brent-Cochrane said.  “The rebels will eventually fall into our lap.”

“You will go,” Percival said.  “Captain Quick will remain with me.  I have much to discuss with her.”

Brent-Cochrane kept his opinion on that, if he had an opinion, to himself.

“Yes, sir,” Penny said.  Inwardly, she was singing.  She could endure any amount of discomfort if it meant she got to watch as Percival received his just deserts.  “I’ll remain here.”

Chapter Twenty-Six

“I presume,” Colin said with deadly calm, “that you have some kind of explanation for this?”

The crewman in front of him, a man who would never have set foot in Officer Country at all back when the superdreadnaught had fought for the Empire, looked uncomfortable and nervous.  He was standing between two burly Marines, shaking so badly that he could barely stand to attention.  Colin studied him carefully, silently noting the unshaven face and rat-like eyes.  The crewman didn’t cut a very convincing – or reassuring – image.

But then, no one would have expected the fleet’s commanding officer to deal with the matter personally.  Colin had only intervened to make the point that such issues
would
be taken seriously.

“We noted the problem with the atmosphere scrubbers two weeks ago,” Colin said, when the crewman said nothing.  The Marines who had arrested him hadn’t told him why he was under arrest, but Colin suspected that the crewman knew perfectly well why Colin had sent for him – either that or he was guilty of something else.  “Crewman First Class Nix…why were they not replaced?”

Nix flushed.  It wasn’t traditional to spell out a crewman’s full rank.  It was almost inevitably the prelude to a chewing out, if not summary demotion.  The lower decks maintained themselves through harsh discipline, overseen by the NCOs, and a shared belief that attracting the attention of the senior officers was a bad idea.  Colin hoped that Nix understood how much trouble he was in; if not, Colin would feed him the problem step by step, and then inform the crewman of just how he was going to be punished.

He smiled, inwardly.  If nothing else, it was incredibly rare for an Admiral to handle such matters.  His mere involvement would be a stern message to the crew.

“My department was busy coping with the reloading of the missile tubes,” Nix said, finally.  His shaking hadn’t improved.  “We didn’t have time to switch out the atmosphere scrubbers.  Sir, My Lord, those scrubbers are good for at least another two months…”

His voice died away as Colin looked at him, feeling a sudden urge to draw his pistol and shoot Nix though the head.  On the face of it, Nix was quite right; the superdreadnaught – indeed, all military starships – was over-engineered and could have lost half of the scrubbers without the crew finding it hard to breathe.  But then, Nix’s real offence hadn’t been anything to do with not replacing a scrubber.  His offence was far worse.

“You may be right,” Colin said.  Nix sagged against one of the Marines.  Only a complete idiot would have mistaken Colin’s tone for forgiveness.  “You may have been able to leave the scrubbers in place without causing an immediate problem.  Now tell me…what else did you do?”

Nix flushed.  “I did nothing else, My Lord,” he protested.  “It was the only shortcut…”

“I read your 666, Nix,” Colin said, sharply.  “Would you like to know, I wonder, just what it said?”

The Imperial Navy loved paperwork – indeed, Colin had sometimes thought that the fleet could probably have used its piles of paperwork to bombard anyone intending to attack the Empire.  Everything had to be logged; the loss of even a single bullet had to be noted and, eventually, would provoke an inquiry from the bureaucracy.  Everyone on a warship had their own set of paperwork to fill out, most of which Colin had gleefully abandoned once the rebellion had started, yet there were some pieces of paperwork that could not be rejected or converted into toilet paper.

A copy of Form 666 had, according to regulation, to be filled out to account for each and every replaced part on the starship.  A supervising crewman – like Nix – was responsible for filling in the forms for his department, adding them to the database in the ship’s computers and allowing his commanding officer to learn, with the touch of a button, the exact condition of his ship.  Or maybe not; it was far from unknown for junior officers or crewmen to fill out fake 666 forms, knowing that the risk of detection was minimal.  How many Captains would crawl through the tubes connecting one part of the ship to another, knowing that it would smudge their fancy uniforms?  Colin had even heard rumours that entire superdreadnaught squadrons had been allowed to rust, while their commanders filled out fake forms verifying that they existed and pocketing the pay for the crew. 

“I read your 666 very carefully,” Colin said, when Nix declined to reply.  “It told me that the atmosphere scrubbers in your section had been replaced on time, right when you were helping to manhandle missiles through the tubes and out into space.  And then it told me that you and your crews replaced the scrubbers all the way back to the day we took these ships off Commodore Roosevelt.  And yet, when I had the scrubber examined, it had clearly been in place longer than six months.  No wonder those poor recruits complained about the smell!”

His nostrils twitched as he contemplated the issue.  The scrubber had been installed in a tube connecting two compartments, one used to house crewmen and the other used to house recruits from the various asteroid colonies out past the Rim.  The crewmen had ignored it – they were used to having their interests and concerns dismissed by their superiors – but the recruits, all hailing from various asteroid colonies, had taken their concerns to the NCOs, who in turn had taken them to the engineers.  The scrubber had been located and, when the engineers had seen it, they’d called Colin and handed the issue over to him.

There were times when a scrubber would break, even without being in place for far longer than regulations permitted.  Even the finest ships in the Imperial Navy ended up with infestations of mice, rats or even cockroaches, who left their dead bodies on the scrubbers with alarming regularity.  Colin wouldn’t have been angry at Nix if a scrubber had failed in such a way, but Nix had done something incredibly stupid and dangerous.  He had also done something that, in the Imperial Navy, could carry a death sentence.

“And then I checked the numbers,” Colin said, watching Nix wilt under his gaze.  “The number on your 666 documents didn’t match the serial number on the scrubber.  I checked with the database and the number on the scrubber, it seems, was assigned to one that should have been withdrawn over two years ago.  And, needless to say, you didn’t even have that number on your 666 forms at all!”

He controlled himself with an effort.  “Nix, you are in violation of Imperial Navy Regulations,” he stated, flatly.  The formal charge could wait until Colin had a chance to do the paperwork.  His lips twitched.  He’d led his comrades into rebellion and he was still worrying about paperwork!  “Do you wish to face Captain’s Mast or the judgement of your fellow crewmates?”

Nix blanched, his face turning even paler.  Colin – or an Imperial Navy Captain, seeing that Colin had effectively resigned from the service – could legally issue any punishment he liked on his ship, up to and including execution.  And his crewmates wouldn’t be any kinder.  They would know that he’d put their lives in danger and wouldn’t hesitate to issue harsh punishment.  His life wouldn’t be worth living until he quit – as if he could quit now – or someone managed to kill him and make it look like an accident.  Yet, by long tradition, Captain’s Mast was inviolate.  If Colin didn’t kill him, his crewmates wouldn’t kill him either.

But then, Colin knew, tradition was increasingly worthless these days.

“I choose Captain’s Mast,” Nix said, finally.  He lowered his gaze to the floor.  “I will submit to your judgement.”

You’re going to regret that
, Colin thought, coldly.  “Very well,” Colin said.  “Crewman Nix, you are demoted to Crewman Fourth Class, with all the attendant reduction in pay and rights.  Your work will be monitored by the NCOs who will not hesitate to administer punishment should you make additional…mistakes.  In addition, you will receive ten lashes in front of the crew tomorrow after First Quarter.  Do you accept the punishment?”

Nix swallowed hard.  Technically, he could try to refuse, but the thought was absurd.  Colin had let him off lightly and they both knew it.  “Yes, sir,” he said.  Lashing was rare in the Imperial Navy and almost always reserved for gross incompetence or misjudgement.  “I will accept the punishment.”

Colin looked up at the Marines.  “Take him back to his sleeping quarters and have him organise his possessions,” he ordered.  “He is to be transferred to the Fourth Class quarters and assigned a bunk there until further notice.”

“Yes, sir,” the lead Marine said.  Unlike Nix, his voice was brisk and focused.  Marines normally served as police onboard warships, breaking up fights between the crew and maintaining discipline.  If the reports were accurate, Percival had replaced the Marines on his ships with Blackshirts.  Colin smiled at the thought.  Percival could hardly have encouraged the rebels – and mutinous tendencies among his crews – more if he’d ordered them to gun down their own families.  “Come along, you.”

Colin watched as Nix was marched out of the compartment and then closed his eyes, cursing his luck.  Nix was one of the crewmen who just sought to wander through life, uncaring about any higher cause, not even focused on possible promotion.  It wasn't an uncommon type, yet Colin couldn’t afford them on his ships.  It wasn't as if he had the might of the Imperial Navy and Imperial Intelligence behind him.  He might act like a Captain in the Imperial Navy, yet Nix could point out – quite rightly – that he’d walked away from the service and therefore had no command rights. 

But then, Nix had never been taught to think.  The Imperial Navy recruited its lower decks crewmen from poorer worlds, gave them a little rote training and sent them out to pick up the rest on the job.  Nix knew nothing, Colin suspected, about how the starship he was serving on actually worked, perhaps not even why an air scrubber was so important.  The NCOs worked overtime to keep the new recruits from killing themselves, knowing that they would be blamed if one of the newcomers accidentally blew up the ship.  The senior officers, who had been through the Academy as cadets of rare promise (or so Colin had been told) rarely understood what happened below decks.

There were ships where a good cadre of NCOs and a caring commanding officer ensured that they were a joy to serve on…and ships that were hellish nightmares for young crewmen, or even junior officers.  The lower decks were dominated by thuggish crewmen, who bullied recruits out of their pay, created stills for illegal consumption of alcohol and – often – far worse.  Colin knew all about the abuse of power practiced by Admiral Percival, Stacy Roosevelt and their twisted kin, but the lower decks could match their sadism, if not their sophistication.  He wondered absently if Stacy Roosevelt had known about the powder keg under her feet, before realising that it was unlikely.  She wouldn’t have cared if she had.

Back when Colin had been promoted to Commander and serving as the XO of HMS
Shadow
, he had made it his business to understand and tame the lower decks.  It was ironic, but his exile at Percival’s hands had introduced him to a whole new side of the Imperial Navy, one he had never realised existed.  And he’d won; he’d cleaned out the bullies and convinced the NCOs to support him.  After the war, once the Empire had started to reform, Colin intended to ensure that the lower decks became safe places to work.  The bullies could take a short trip out of the airlock in their underwear.

Shaking his head, he turned back to the report from Flag Captain Jeremy Damiani, who had been doing his own checks on the other side of the superdreadnaught.  Colin knew that he had stepped on the man’s toes mercilessly, but he knew that there wasn't any choice – and besides, he needed to be intimately familiar with the superdreadnaught.  Damiani hadn’t been allowed to clean out the problems on his own ship – Stacy Roosevelt had refused him permission to do anything of the sort, although Colin had no idea why – and he had been horrified by what he’d found.  Colin had been more pragmatic, if only because he’d seen worse.  There were starships in the Imperial Navy that were not, in truth, commanded by their Captains.

He placed the datapad aside and stared up at the tactical star chart glowing in front of him.  On the way back from Piccadilly, they’d hit two smaller worlds, wiping out a pair of Imperial Navy facilities in one and looting the other, where Percival had created a small resupply base for his ships.  Colin had wondered if it had been a trap – it was odd for Percival to show so much forethought – so he’d gone in carefully, only to loot the station and flicker out – as far as he could tell – without any pursuit.  If someone drew the three points he’d attacked on a star chart, they’d see them running in a line towards the Rim, but
not
towards the parts of the Rim that were part of the Popular Front.  It might waste some of Percival’s time and resources.

Colin grinned to himself.  As far as he could tell, Percival’s only hope was that Colin would expose himself, allowing one or both of Percival’s superdreadnaught squadrons the chance to intercept him and break his force.  Percival was doubtless already trying to search the Rim for his base – or his supporting elements – but that would be a thankless task.  The Rim and the Beyond was vast, with hundreds of hidden colonies; Percival would have some problems tracking down and locating the right one.  The prospect of betrayal was far more serious, but Colin had taken ample precautions.  The vast majority of the Rim’s citizens had no idea where he was based and Colin intended for it to stay that way.