Chapter 67: Meeting Admiral Redmill

The next two hours were spent quietly monitoring the ship’s systems as we continued to crawl towards Yulara and the orbital station. Blaine and I said little as we watched the one prototype ship circle its target. Only two more attack runs were attempted and one confirmed Kelsey’s comments about the weapon’s short range. The ship fired from what appeared to be about twice the distance as the first run only for every shot to fade away before they reached the moon.

Blaine repeated his thanks that we were not on a ship of the same class. I said nothing until about fifteen minutes after that pass when a chime indicated that a new message had arrived.

I pulled it up on my personal display and headset. This time the person revealed was a young woman wearing the uniform of a senior enlisted man. “Corsica, please come to two-nine-seven. A blue beacon will be lit to show where to dock at the station.”

“Helm, we’ve been instructed to turn to two-niner-seven,” I said. “There should be a blue beacon.”

“I see it,” Blaine said. “Um ... If we go straight there the airlock would be on the port side. We don’t have a connection on that side.”

I looked up and could see that Blaine was correct. The instructions would have the station on our port side, where there was no airlock on Corsica.

“Give me a moment,” I said. “I better put in a call and explain.”

I activated the communications system and pinged a hail to the orbital station. A moment later someone spoke. “Yulara Command, state your business.”

“This is Captain Mark Parker of Corsica. We are on approach in order to dock, but the orders we were give asked us to dock on our port side. This ship only has a starboard airlock,” I stated.

“You don’t have a portside airlock?” the voice asked.

“That is correct. This ship has a single airlock. Can we be rerouted or do you want my helmsman to turn us around after we pass the airlock you have designated for us?” I asked.

“One moment,” the voice said. To my surprise we heard classical music over the connection.

“What?” Blaine asked.

“Hold music,” I said as we listened to a full orchestra play some elaborate piece. “I guess they aren’t completely organized.”

The music ended as abruptly as it had started. “Captain Parker?”

“Speaking,” I replied.

“This is Major Greenfeld,” the voice said. “I’m sorry, but Corsica is the first Patrician we’ve seen and the duty sergeant was not aware that you only had a starboard side airlock. Is it a major problem to turn around?”

I looked over at Blaine. The young man shrugged. “In theory we can do it easily. I’ll probably make sure we are fully past the station before performing the turn, but with practice could probably do it before we arrive and just coast into position.”

“My helmsman is confident he can turn us around,” I said. “Looking at our current speed, I’d estimate about twenty minutes until we can dock.”

“My tracking team is signaling the same thing,” Major Greenfeld replied.

“Who should come with me to meet the Admiral?” I asked.

“Just you,” Major Greenfeld replied. “Admiral Redmill did indicate an interest in holding a formal greeting party, but there have been a few too many Sa’arm visits to nearby systems. He believes your ship will need to continue its patrol immediately, so your meeting will occur right after you dock.”

“My crew is rather green so I’m not going to rush the docking,” I said firmly.

“I can do it,” Blaine said.

“Do not hurry. Our most experienced teams have only four months in their ships and we’ve seen what happens if an inexperienced helmsman tries something they aren’t ready to do,” the Major replied.

“Can do. I need to organize my officers and tell them to prepare for a quick launch,” I said.

“Do that,” Major Greenfeld said. “I’ll let the Admiral know you are on final approach.

A chime indicated the end of the call. Blaine took a deep breath. “So just you.”

“I guess so,” I said.

I hit the controls to activate the intercom to the engine room.

“Engine room, is that you captain?” Ensign Daniels replied.

“Yes, Warren. I wanted you to know that Admiral Redmill wants me to meet with him individually. Once we dock, I’ll need to take the watch while I attend the conference,” I said.

“I can handle it,” Warren replied. “Are you sure you can go alone?”

“I will survive,” I said. “I get a feeling that Admiral Redmill would like to meet all my officers, but he can’t right now due to the need to search all the nearby systems.”

“That makes sense,” Warren replied. “I’ll watch for new messages regarding future orders.”

“Thank you,” I said. “Carry on until then.”

“Do you want me to try to do a snap turn?” Blaine asked as I shut down the intercom system.

“No, we can wait for you to pass by the station. There is no need to take such a big risk,” I replied.

“But I know I can do it,” Blaine said.

“Practice it back in the Crucible system. When we know you can do it consistently, I’ll let you try it here in front of officers we don’t know. Remember that at least some of the officers here served back on Earth. They will probably not like anyone showboating,” I said.

Blaine looked worried for a moment. “Do you think they’ll break up the crew?”

“I hope not, but I’ll find out more in a few minutes,” I replied.

“True,” Blaine said. “I can start the turn now.”

Blaine leaned forward and rapidly ran his hands over the controls. The viewscreen seemed to go wild as Corsica spun around while continuing to fly in a straight line. A moment later the ship stopped with its starboard side facing the station.

“I told you I could do it,” Blaine said happily.

“And if you ran into the station?” I asked as the ship started forward again. Blaine was clearly working to stop right next to the airlock.

“Corsica, allow the AI to take over. It can guide you to the right spot,” a female voice said over our intercom.

“How?” Blaine asked.

“Obviously its set up to allow them to interject when ships are close to the station. Makes some sense,” I replied. “Well, I should get to the airlock.”

Blaine nodded as I stood up and walked off the bridge. The ship seemed ominously silent as I strode down the starboard passage to the airlock.

The door was closed when I arrived, but opened a moment later. A ping from the ceiling caused me to look up as I stepped forward to enter the airlock passage. “Captain, Major Greenfeld is waiting for you on the station.”

“On my way,” I said as the first door closed. The next one opened almost immediately.

The remaining doors all opened almost as soon as the previous one closed. My passage through the airlock sequence was surprisingly quick and a moment later I stepped out onto the station. A man I recognized as Major Greenfeld was standing there. Two uniformed privates flanked him. They saluted.

I tried to snap to attention and saluted Major Greenfeld. “Mark Parker, Captain of Corsica reporting.”

The Major’s eyes widened as he returned my salute. “At ease.”

I waited for him to drop the salute and then dropped mine. “Sorry, if that was a bit sloppy. My experience with the military pretty much started after I was picked up.”

The Major nodded. “I’m to take you to Admiral Redmill immediately. Follow me.”

The man turned to his right and started to walk towards an open door. I followed as the two privates headed off in another direction.

The Major stopped at the doorway and stepped aside. “You should go first,” he told me.

I glanced at his hands. They were empty so I stepped through the doorway. “Where to next?” I asked.

“Don’t you have a station at Crucibleat?” the Major asked.

“There is a small docking base carved into one of the moons, but that’s it. And no one is based in the station. We just have the two ships and a small marine training cadre. My understanding is that Crucibleat is supposed to become a marine training and staging base in the future. We were the first load of colonists,” I replied.

“Was there a pick up at a high school?” the Major asked.

“No,” I replied. “I was picked up from a fast food restaurant. I think four of the people picked up there were high school age, but we were the only ones on the colony transport. Most of the people picked up were college age with a number of older businessmen.”

“Interesting,” the Major said as we walked up to a door. Someone had carefully stenciled the words “Yularat Command: Admiral Redmill” to the right of the door. Major Greenfeld immediately used his knuckled to knock on the door.

“Enter!” a stern voice called out.

The door opened. Major Greenfeld used his right arm to block me as he leaned forward through the doorway. “Captain Parker, sir, but...”

“Send him in,” Admiral Redmill said. “And then I need to know how the prototype is doing. What is the maximum range on those new disruptors? And can Commander Dawson increase the range at all?”

“But sir,” Major Greenfeld said again.

“Not now, I need to get Corsica back out on patrol,” the Admiral snapped.

The Major slowly stood up. He turned to me and scowled. “Get in there,” he snapped. After that he turned around and marched away.

I walked into the Admiral’s office. The requirements of service on a ship meant I had no hat to remove, but my hands twitched as I approached the empty chair I saw there.

Admiral Redmill was looking at a computer screen. He appeared to be in his early forty’s. The uniform he was wearing fit well over what was clearly an athletic body, but there were worry lines around his eyes and his hair was speckled with gray. The man waited for me to reach the chair before turning to look at me.

I had a hand on the back of the chair as he turned. His eyes widened as he looked at me. “You’re the captain?” he asked.

I stood at attention and saluted. “Captain Mark Parker, sir.”

“You?” the man asked again.

“Mark Parker,” the AI intoned from above us. “CAP score of eight point four. Picked up sixty-three days ago. Pre-assigned to command track based on observed activities after his original test. When his pickup group was assigned to Crucibleat he was selected as Corsica’s initial commander.”

The man looked up at the ceiling. “Well, I’ll be,” he said. I noticed he had a pronounced British accent. “I knew that civilians were beginning to serve, but to give a teenager command.”

I carefully sat down. “It surprised me as well. I was one of only four high school age citizens on the colony ship, but I was given command. The man given command of Ipanema had some issues with my age.”

“How many military personnel are on your ship?” the Admiral asked.

“Sir? My impression is that we become members of the Confederacy military the day we are picked up. So I’d have to say all of them,” I replied. “We are one officer short, but all twenty-seven people on Corsica are considered part of the military.”

“I meant anyone who served on Earth before they were picked up,” the Admiral said with a shake of his head. “Save me from people who answer questions literally.”

“The only person with previous experience on our colony transport was a marine Sergeant. He took over training about half of the colonists. They are supposed to become a training cadre for the system. The remaining colonists were split between Corsica and Ipanema. I was told I was commanding Corsica and a man named Kenneth Prescott was named to command Ipanema. We ended up handling our own training,” I replied.

“And that worked?” the Admiral asked.

“Not as well as I might have hoped. My crew missed a number of problems when we first boarded Corsica. My engineering department believes we’ve caught all of them, but I had two crew sent to medical pods because of incidents,” I replied.

“Wait, you have one of the Portsmouth Patricians?” the Admiral asked.

“What’s special about them?” I asked.

“Portsmouth was set up to be a major shipyard for the Confederacy. Unfortunately one of the officers involved in getting the replication stations set up was in a hurry. No one is sure how he did it, but when he transferred all of the replicator data to the new units, he rushed the process and dozens of files were corrupted,” the Admiral said.