Innes in Command
Copyright© 2026 by Lumpy
Chapter 7
He was going to have to get used to this schedule. On the ship, they were split into three shifts, eight-hour shifts with a full day off every four shifts, not that he’d been on the ship long enough to get settled into that rhythm. Here it was twelve hours on, twelve hours off, every day until the detachment ended.
He was sure he’d get his system working with it, but there had been so much to do to get everything set up, arrange the work schedules, handle the people management and the small detail part of the job that Wexler preferred to delegate over to him, that he’d worked almost twenty hours the day before and was back at it with just four hours sleep.
The coffee and stims were helping, but what he needed was some rest.
“Who wired this?” Pierce said. “A drunk, or just someone who hates me personally?”
Chief Pierce hunched over the tactical board, muttering under his breath as he traced cable runs trying to find a disconnect that had popped up an hour before.
“Could be both, Chief,” Novak said.
“Definitely both.” Pierce yanked a panel loose, peered inside, and sighed.
Innes smiled. He actually found he liked Pierce. The man was blunt and extremely to the point, but he also had a sense of humor about him and had already shown he was very good at his job.
“Boarding One, you are cleared to depart,” Lind said.
The shuttle pilot acknowledged.
“Boarding One away,” Novak said, logging the time.
This was the main task of their detachment. All ships that came in were scanned, using the computer to check for common signs of smuggling or dangerous materials, but smugglers were clever and had gotten good enough at fooling sensors that the only real way to clear a suspect when enough red flags popped up was boots on deck.
Which is what they were doing right now, as an assault shuttle headed out to a jumpy little freighter called the Greenhaven.
The Greenhaven’s captain had been evasive on comms. Not lying exactly, but definitely dancing around questions she should have answered straight out. That, plus a manifest that tripped two-thirds of their flags, was enough to warrant a look-see.
Innes let his focus settle on the main display. The Greenhaven sat at the outer edge of Shiro’s protected zone, parked in a holding position well clear of the traffic lanes. That, at least, station control had gotten right. The freighter waited exactly where it was supposed to be, out of the way, stationary, ready for inspection.
It was looking to be a busy day. They had a second freighter, the Heng Li, also on the flagged list, waiting to be inspected after the Greenhaven.
For a few minutes, he just watched the shuttle icon arc toward the Greenhaven.
“Control’s handing off Heng Li,” Lind said.
Innes’s brow crinkled. The plot clearly showed that the freighter was still deep in the approach corridor, nowhere near a holding position.
Damn it. Not again.
The previous shift had seen three of these, station control trying to pass ships to the detachment while they were still in active traffic lanes instead of waiting until they’d reached designated holding positions. Wexler had said he’d handle it, but clearly that hadn’t happened.
“Reject it,” he said. “Tell them we’ll take the handoff when she’s parked, not before.”
“Yes, sir.” Lind keyed her console. “Shiro Control, Detachment Ops. Negative on Heng Li handoff. Advise when the vessel is in the designated holding position.”
“Control just bounced Heng Li from F-three to J-five,” Novak said, frowning. “And there’s another ship coming in behind her. Prosperity Tide. She’s bending toward J-five now, two hundred clicks back.”
Pierce dropped his tools and moved to stand over Novak’s shoulder. “Making room for that ore barge?”
“Looks like. Stack wants them capturing one after the other.”
Innes sat up straighter. “They’re routing Prosperity Tide down the same corridor as Heng Li?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did they pull Heng Li out of the approach first?”
Novak checked. “Negative. Heng Li’s still on her original vector. They handed her off to us but didn’t clear her from the lane.”
Innes looked at the plot again.
“Novak, separation and trend.”
“Working on it. I don’t have full telemetry on Prosperity Tide yet. Control’s been slow pushing her data across.”
“How slow?”
“I’ve got position and heading, but no velocity profile and no projected track. Just the icon.”
“Then get me ears on traffic control. I want to hear what they’re telling these ships.”
“Patching in now.”
The speaker crackled, and suddenly they were listening to Shiro’s traffic net.
“ ... J-Stack, confirm Prosperity Tide is on auto-capture for bay eight.”
“Control, J-Stack. Confirmed, Prosperity Tide is slaved and on profile, but I’m showing Heng Li still in the corridor. What’s her status?”
“Heng Li has been handed over to the CDF detachment; she’s their responsibility now.”
“Understood control, but she’s still in my lane. I need her moved before Prosperity Tide gets any closer.”
“That’s not our call anymore, J-Stack. Take it up with the detachment.”
Heng Li’s icon sat in the middle of the approach corridor, right where Control had left her when they’d tried to pass her off. Prosperity Tide was coming up behind. A sudden track line appeared, arching through Heng Li and Prosperity Tide as Novak finally got telemetry.
“Sir,” Novak said. “I’ve got Prosperity Tide’s velocity now. Range nine hundred and falling. Relative closing at three hundred meters a second.”
“What’s the narrowest pass on their current curves?”
There was a long pause, and then he said, “Twelve meters longitudinal. About double that lateral once they cross the inner handoff.”
“Twelve meters between two bricks that size?” Pierce said.
The comm crackled again.
“Control, J-Stack, I need a call,” the person sounding more nervous than they had a moment ago. “Do I hold Prosperity Tide or does someone move Heng Li? If I break my stack without your sign-off and nothing happens, I’m dead. If I don’t and they trade paint, I’m dead. Someone up the chain has to own this.”
“J-Stack, Control. Heng Li is flagged CDF-priority, we’re not adjusting her vector without their sign-off. Take it up with the detachment.”
Lind turned to Innes. “They’re waiting for us to move her?”
“We rejected it,” Pierce said. “It should still be in their pattern.”
Innes stared at the plot. Six hundred. Five-ninety-four. Five-eighty-nine.
Nobody was driving the bus. Control had tried to pass Heng Li to the detachment, gotten rejected, and then updated Prosperity Tide’s instructions as if the freighter had vanished from the lane. J-Stack could see the collision coming, but couldn’t get anyone to own the call, and the detachment didn’t have the authority to manage approach vectors; that wasn’t their job.
But the numbers kept falling. Five-seventy. Five-sixty.
“Sir,” Pierce said. “Clock’s running.”
Innes could see the disaster coming, but he also knew where his authority lay, or rather, where it didn’t. Wexler had made their area of responsibility clear, and was equally clear on his reluctance to get involved in things outside their purview, which would almost certainly include stepping on Jun’s traffic controllers.
But the numbers kept falling.
“Range?” Innes asked.
“Five-seventy and closing.” Novak was trying hard not to sound rattled.
Innes hit a key, opening the side channel to J-Stack.
“J-Stack, Detachment Ops. I show Heng Li and Prosperity Tide inside a hundred seconds of your inner handoff with twelve meters between them. Do you have a hold vector generated for Prosperity Tide?”
“I have a hold, Detachment,” the person said, sounding relieved that someone was asking questions and not just hand-waving off a disaster. “But don’t have the authority to issue it. Control won’t give me an override code because Heng Li’s flagged as yours.”
“We rejected that handoff. Heng Li isn’t ours yet.”
“Tell that to Control, they say she’s your problem now.”
“You have less than three minutes until it doesn’t matter whose problem she is.”
“Then someone has under three minutes to make a call. Stack out.”
The channel died. They did not want to be responsible for whatever decision was made. Exactly the kind of thing that was needed for disasters to happen.
“Sir?” Pierce prodded.
“I know, Chief.” Innes turned. “Lind, get me on the traffic control frequency. Direct.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Freighter Heng Li. This is Concordian Defense Fleet Detachment, Shiro Station. Kill your current deceleration profile and cut all forward acceleration relative to Shiro and hold on corridor J-five at range five hundred kilometers. Maintain present attitude. Confirm.”
There was no immediate response. The channel was hot, just no one was saying anything. He pictured the captain staring at his panel, trying to figure out what he’d just stepped in.
“Detachment, this is Heng Li,” a man’s voice said finally. “We are on assigned approach. Shiro Control has not issued a hold.”
“I’m issuing a hold under Republic authority. Comply, or I pull your inspection clearance and park you out-system until your hull rusts. Now kill your decel profile and confirm hold now.”
Another beat. Lind’s hand drifted toward the mute switch, then back.
“Detachment, Heng Li. Killing decel. Holding vector at five hundred.”
On the plot, Heng Li’s curve bent, velocity eased, timing tags slid. Innes didn’t give anyone time to argue. He flipped channels.
“Freighter Prosperity Tide, this is Concordian Defense Fleet Detachment, Shiro Station. Maintain your current deceleration profile on corridor J-five and continue capture to bay eight. Do not alter course unless instructed by Shiro Control. Confirm.”
“Detachment, Prosperity Tide.” A woman’s voice said. “We were told to sit two hundred behind Heng Li. If he’s stopping, I’d prefer not to run up his...”
“Heng Li is now holding at five hundred. You’re clear to continue. Maintain current profile. Confirm.”
A brief silence. “Prosperity Tide copies. Maintaining profile, capture bay eight.”
He cut the channel before she could add anything and came back up on Shiro’s net.
“Shiro Control, Detachment Ops. For your log, I have ordered Heng Li to hold at the five-hundred-kilometer mark and confirmed Prosperity Tide to continue to bay eight. There was a flagged vessel in an active approach corridor that needed to be cleared. I am handing you control of both ships. We will not accept handoff of Heng Li until she is parked in her inspection hold slot. Confirm.”
The pause was shorter this time. When Control came back, they sounded highly annoyed.
“Confirmed.”
Much more reasonable orders started going out to the two ships as things got back on track. On the plot, the separation numbers climbed. The collision warning bracket blinked once and vanished.
“Separation now one-twenty and rising,” Novak said. “No risk of contact remaining.”
“Crewman Lind. Note the event in our log as only a near miss, attach the recording, and note the detachment’s responsibility for the traffic override, but otherwise leave it unspecified as to the cause of the situation.”
“Sir?”
“It’s okay. Just note it, please, Crewman.”
“Yes, sir.”
There was a beep, and Chief Pierce went to the tactical board, which had been all but forgotten in the moment, pressing a series of buttons. “Boarding One just reported feet dry on Greenhaven’s hull. Captain’s making noise, but they’re inside and working.”
“Good.”
Well, not good, exactly, but at least it was something they were actually supposed to be doing.
Of course, this wasn’t going to be the end of the whole ordeal. There would be a reaction. Ten minutes felt about right for a pissed-off station commander to make his way to the section.
He was off by two minutes.
Commander Jun Hua, who was on the list to come into the detachment area without approval, stepped into the operations room with two station security officers at his shoulders. One marine followed them in, looking past them to Innes, as if to say, ‘Is everything alright?’ Brooks, Innes thought, pulling from his ever-building catalog of names. It was important to know the men who served under you, and Brooks showed good instincts for such a young private. Innes just gave him a small nod but kept his attention on the station commander.
“Ensign Kingsford.” Jun used the name like a curse.
“Commander. I’m glad you’re here. I assume Lieutenant Wexler briefed you on the handoff issue?”
Jun’s expression shifted. Not quite confusion, but close. “Handoff issue?”
Innes hadn’t thought so. Not with the same issue happening again so soon.
“The premature handoffs. Last night, station control tried to pass us three ships while they were still in active traffic lanes instead of waiting for them to be in holding positions. Lieutenant Wexler said he would coordinate with your people to get the procedures clarified.”
“No one has spoken to me about any procedural issues. What I have heard is that Concordian officers are issuing approach orders to civilian ships on my channels, on your second day here, no less. After we agreed you would handle inspections only after my people hand vessels off in designated holding positions.”
“Commander, I apologize,” Innes said. “I was under the impression that conversation had already happened. It clearly hasn’t, and that’s created confusion on both sides.”
“Confusion, is that what we’re calling it?”