Innes in Command
Copyright© 2026 by Lumpy
Chapter 10
The run-in with Wexler was enough to push Innes to go to Sage’s lab. He needed something to take his mind off the lieutenant’s threats. It had only been a few weeks since graduation, and he’d already started seeing that the high ideals and honor he’d looked for in the Navy were perhaps not all the academy recruiters had sold them as.
Not that he was willing to let someone like Wexler sour him completely. That would be too much like letting him win.
Sage’s lab was exactly what Innes expected. It was just as cramped and filled with equipment as someone like Sage would like. She didn’t notice him at first, and he’d just stood there and watched her live in her environment.
She certainly was a woman of focus.
She was happy to see him, although she did chastise him for taking so long to come and see her. He’d partially feared her invitation had been something of a formality, and not something she actually meant.
He’d run into that many times as a teenager, stuck in the fanciest and priciest schools his father could find, surrounded by people who often said things because they thought that’s what society dictated, but never meaning it.
She’d then launched into forty-five minutes of the most enthusiastic explanation of gravitation mapping that had probably ever been given. He was lost after about ten minutes, and stopped understanding half the words after twenty; but he didn’t have the heart to tell her, because she was genuinely enjoying having someone to talk to about it.
Eventually, she took a long enough break for him to ask her to dinner, since he hadn’t eaten since mid-shift and it was, well, lunch for her.
She’d agreed, and they found themselves on the promenade ring, sitting in a narrow stall wedged between a textile shop and a tea house. Next to many of the other places on the Promenade, it was very low-frills. The seating consisted of four stools bolted to the deck, facing a counter that overlooked the shopping district below.
The food was simple: noodles in a rich broth with thin-sliced protein that was probably vat-grown somewhere on the station.
“It’s just wall-to-wall red tape,” Sage was saying as she shoveled food into her mouth with an impressive amount of gusto. “SENTINEL controls access to the data systems, but they’re not a research institution. They’re a security organization that happens to manage scientific information. I’d thought working in academia was bad, the number of committees and approvals I have to go through for the smallest thing is astounding.”
“I’d think it was a good thing, since SENTINEL makes sure the gate coordinates stay updated and free from meddling or alteration by political groups,” Innes said, basically repeating how textbooks described the organization.
“If that’s what they were doing, then yes, but it goes way beyond that. They guard not just the data, but every aspect of their organization like they were a new version of the Church of Humanity,” she said, referencing the religion at the heart of the Taran Dominion. “It’s become almost dogmatic at this point. Sorry, I tend to get excited about these things, and I’m told I can carry on a bit too much. I’m sure you didn’t come see me just to listen to a lecture on bureaucracies.”
Innes laughed. “Trust me, I know bureaucracy. I have no doubt SENTINEL is every bit as difficult as you described, but I’m not sure it is anything like the insanity that is inside the CDF.”
“Oh, really?”
“I mean, maybe.”
“Try me.”
“Okay, so the only reason I’m on this station at all is red tape. When my commander, Captain Barrett, assigned us to this station, she made it clear the whole thing wasn’t her idea. Someone above her ‘suggested’ the arrangement, and she wasn’t happy about it. And actually, it’s kind of crazy that someone would want us here. My lieutenant is getting his first independent command, which is a significant posting for someone at his rank, and I’m a brand-new ensign, completely green, fresh out of the academy. This is an important enough posting that it shouldn’t be anyone’s first command, and I shouldn’t be second in command of anything yet. I didn’t actually get to finish learning my primary duties on the ship before I had to learn new ones here, which is crazy. The whole setup makes no sense unless there’s something else going on that I’m not seeing.”
“That’s strange. Why would they do that?”
“The captain said it was because of our ‘social standing.’ Wexler is from House Wexler, I’m from House Kingsford, so we’re from two of the biggest noble families in Concordia. I figure someone thought having us out here would be good for diplomacy or something, but if that’s the case, they picked the wrong Kingsford. I joined the fleet specifically to get away from all of that. I’m not part of my father’s world, and I don’t intend to be.”
“Wait,” Sage said, looking at him a little sideways. “You’re from a noble family?”
That might be the thing he liked best about Sage. She was the first person he might have ever met who didn’t care who his family was. Even those people who didn’t seem to hold it against him were still very aware of it, and it always got a mention.
It made him feel like he could be just Innes when he was talking to her, and not Innes Kingsford, disappointing son of Duke Kingsford, heir to House Kingsford.
“Against my will. My father is the First Lord, the head of the Centrist Coalition. Which is to say he’s important, or at least he thinks he is, and I’ve spent most of my life trying to be something other than his son. The fleet was supposed to be my way out, except now I’m stuck on a station with the son of my father’s biggest rival, which is a pretty big coincidence.”
“It’s not, and I’m betting you don’t think it is either,” Sage said.
“Okay, no, I don’t think it is, but you didn’t realize I was a noble until a few seconds ago, so I’m curious how you came to the conclusion that it’s not a coincidence?”
“Simple, you said your captain wasn’t happy about the assignment. If there was a good reason to put you here, I’m betting she wouldn’t be nearly as upset about it. She’d just follow orders. But she did object, which means she doesn’t think there’s a good reason either.”
“Well, that wouldn’t be a hard concept to arrive at, since neither of us has diplomatic experience. Wexler’s been in tactical his whole career, and I just graduated. I grew up around politics, sure, but I’ve never actually done anything political in my life.”
“Exactly. If they wanted diplomats, they’d have sent diplomats, but they wanted you specifically, two people from rival families, no diplomatic training, assigned together over your captain’s objections. So it’s obvious it isn’t just coincidence it’s the two of you.”
“Since you were so quick to figure that out, what do you think the real reason is?”
“I would have no way of knowing. Politics doesn’t make sense to me the way other things do. But...” she trailed off, frowning. “You said your families are rivals. How bad is it?”
“Pretty bad. They lead the Protectionist faction, we lead the Centrists, and we’ve been at each other’s throats for generations over everything from trade policy to military funding. The only thing they agree on is that they don’t agree on anything.”
“The Protectionists.” Sage’s eyes narrowed. “They’re the ones who want to pull back from these systems, right? Reduce the military presence in places like this?”
“That’s the main part of their platform, yeah.”
“So the Protectionists pushed to reduce the ships here, and now their man has an independent command on a station in that same system, away from any real oversight. Yet another coincidence.”
Yes, it probably was about corruption, but since he was messaging a Wexler trade compound, and he wasn’t high enough in the family to be giving orders, then he was most likely reporting, not deciding what was going to happen.
“I’ll admit it did not feel like a coincidence when we got our orders. And he’s been sending encrypted messages back to his family’s compound,” Innes said. “He’s not high enough in his house to be giving orders, which means it’s more likely he’s reporting to someone. There’s also the fact that he’s gotten very friendly with the Meryd Trade Counsel here.”
“There you go! That’s exactly what I mean.” Sage’s voice picked up speed, the way it did when she was excited about gravitational waves. “So someone put him here and the detachment is just cover. He’s here to do something for his family, and they set it up so he’d have the freedom to do it. Which means you’re probably here for the same reason, just for the other side.”
“Now I know that part isn’t true. My father knows I’d never work for him. I’ve made that clear enough times that even he’s gotten the message. Putting me here to spy or play politics would be completely pointless.”
“Would it? You joined the fleet to get away from your family. You believe in duty, in doing what’s right, you said so yourself. And your father would know that.”
“Of course he would. That’s exactly why...”
“So he wouldn’t expect you to spy for him. He’d expect you to be you.” She said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “And you, being you, would notice when someone like Wexler was breaking regulations. You’d document it and, already having a grudge against the political system, you’d eventually report it through proper channels, because that’s what someone who believes in duty does.”
Innes opened his mouth to argue, then stopped.
His father knew him, knew how he thought, how he reacted to things. Putting predictable people in positions and letting their predictability do what he wanted them to do was exactly how his father acted. And when it came to this, Innes had to admit he was predictable. Hell, he’d already started chafing at Wexler’s command.
That just pissed him off all the more.
“You might be right. God, I hate that man.”