Once a Hero

Chapter Three

Esmay had time to meditate on those words as the long arm of the Fleet’s judicial branch separated her from the other junior officers, put her aboard a courier-escort, and whisked her to Fleet Headquarters a full eight days before the others arrived. She met her defense counsel, a balding middle-aged major who looked more like a bureaucrat than an officer; he had the incipient paunch of someone who avoided the gym except in the last few weeks before the annual physical fitness test.

“It would’ve made sense for them to link the cases,” Major Chapin grumbled, poring over Esmay’s file. “Starting at the back end, you are the hero of Xavier; you saved the planet, the system, and an admiral’s niece’s ass. Unfortunately—”

“It was explained to me,” Esmay said.

“Good. At least none of the records are missing. We’ll need to prepare separately for the Captain’s Board of Inquiry and for each of the main threats of the court martial. I hope you have an organized mind—”

“I think so,” Esmay said.

“Good. For the time being, forget military protocol, if you can; I’m going to call you Esmay, and you’re going to call me Fred, because we have too much work to let formalities slow us down. Clear?”

“Yes, sir—Fred.”

“Good. Now—tell me everything you told the investigators, and then everything you didn’t tell them. The whole story of your life isn’t too long. I won’t get bored, and I don’t know what’s useful until I hear it.”

In the next days, Esmay found that Major Chapin meant what he’d said. She also found herself increasingly comfortable talking to him, which made her nervous. She reminded herself that she was a grownup, not a child who could throw herself at any friendly adult when she needed comfort. She even mentioned the nightmares, the ones connected to Xavier.

“You might want to consider a psych session,” he said. “If it’s bothering you that much.”

“It’s not now,” she said. “It was those first days after . . .”

“Sounds normal to me. If you’re sleeping well enough to stay alert . . . there’s an advantage in not going for a psych evaluation now, you see, because it might look as if we’re going to plead mental incompetence.”

“Oh.”

“But by all means, if you need it—”

“I don’t,” Esmay said firmly.

“Good . . . now about this petty thievery you said was plaguing the enlisted lockers . . .”

Circumstances conspired to shift the date of the court martial so that the Captain’s Board met first. Major Chapin grumbled about this, too.

“You don’t take counsel to a Board of Inquiry, so you’ll have to remember everything we’ve talked about by yourself. You can always ask for a short recess and come ask me, but it leaves a bad impression. Damn it—I wanted you to have experience before you went in alone.”

“Can’t be helped,” Esmay said. He looked mildly surprised, which almost annoyed her. Had he expected her to complain when it could do no good? To make a useless fuss, and to him?

“I’m glad you’re taking it that way. Now—if they don’t bring up the matter of the damage to the nav computer, you have two choices—” That session went on for hours, until Esmay felt she understood the point of Chapin’s advice, as well as the advice itself.

The morning the Board hearing began, Chapin walked her into the building and all the way to the anteroom where he would wait in case she asked for a recess and his guidance. “Chin up, Lieutenant,” he said as the door opened. “Keep in mind that you won the battle and didn’t lose your ship.”

The Board of Inquiry made no allowances for the irregular way in which Esmay had arrived in command of Despite, or so it seemed from the questions. If a Jig commanded in battle, that jig had better know what she was doing, and every error Esmay made came up.

Even before the next senior officer died of wounds, why had she not prepared for command—surely that mess on the bridge could have been cleaned up faster? Esmay, remembering the near-panic, the need to secure every single compartment, check every single crew member, still thought there were more important things than cleaning blood off the command chair. She didn’t say that, but she did list the other emergencies that had seemed more pressing. The Board chair, a hard-faced one-star admiral Esmay had never heard anything about, good or bad, listened to this with compressed lips and no expression she could read.

Well then, when she took command, why had she chosen to creep into one system—the right move, all agreed, given what she found—and then go blazing back into Xavier, where she had every reason to believe an enemy force lay in wait? Didn’t she realize that more competent mining of the jump point entry corridor would have made that suicidal? Esmay wasn’t about to argue that her decision made sense; she had followed an instinct, not anything rational, and instincts killed more often than they saved.

And why hadn’t she thought of using a microjump to kill momentum earlier, when she might have saved two ships and not just one? Esmay explained about the nav computer, the need to patch a replacement chip from one of the missile-control units. And on and on, hour after hour. They seemed far less interested—in fact, not interested at all—in how the Despite had blown the enemy flagship, than in her mistakes. The Board replayed surveillance material, pointed out discrepancies, lectured, and when it was over at last Esmay went out feeling as if she’d been boiled until all her bones dissolved in the soup.

Major Chapin, waiting in the anteroom where he’d watched on a video link, handed her a glass of water. “You probably don’t believe this, but you did as well as you could, given the circumstances.”

“I don’t think so.” She sipped the water. Major Chapin sat watching her until she had finished that glass.

“Lieutenant, I know you’re tired and probably feel that you’ve been pulled sideways through a wire gauge, but you need to hear this. Boards of Inquiry are supposed to be grueling. That’s part of their purpose. You stood up there and told the truth; you didn’t get flustered; you didn’t waffle; you didn’t make excuses. Your handling of the nav computer failure was perfect—you gave them the facts and then dropped it. You let Timmy Warndstadt chew you up one side and down the other, and at the end you were still on your feet answering stupid questions in a civil tone of voice. I’ve worked with senior commanders who did worse.”

“Really?” She wasn’t sure if it was hope she felt, or simply astonishment that someone—anyone—could approve of something she did.

“Really. Not only that, remember what I told you at the beginning: you didn’t lose your ship and you made a decisive move in the battle. They can’t ignore that, even if they think it was blind accident. And after your testimony, they’re much less likely to think it was accidental. I wish they’d asked more about the details; you were right not to volunteer it, since it would’ve sounded like making excuses, but . . . it annoys me when they ignore briefs. I put it all in; the least they could do is read it and ask the right questions. Of course there will be negative comments; there always are, if something gets as far as a Board. But they know—whether they’re willing to admit it or not—that you did well for a junior in combat for the first time.”

The door opened, and Esmay had to go back. She returned to her place, facing the long table with the five officers.

“This is a complicated case,” Admiral Warndstadt said. “And the Board has arrived at a complicated resolution. Lieutenant Suiza, this Board finds that your handling of the Despite from the time you assumed effective command after Dovir’s wounds rendered him incapable of taking the bridge, to your . . . precipitous . . . return to Xavier, was within the standards expected of a Fleet captain.” Esmay felt the first quiver of hope that she was not going to be tossed out on her ear, just before being imprisoned as the result of the court-martial.

Admiral Warndstadt went on, this time reading from notes. “However, your tactical decisions, when you returned to the Xavier system, were markedly substandard. This Board notes that this was your first experience of combat and your first time in command of a ship; the Board makes appropriate allowance for these circumstances. Still, the Board recommends that you not be considered for command of a Regular Space Service vessel until you have shown, in combat situations, the level of tactical and operational competence expected of warship commanders.” Esmay almost nodded; as Chapin had warned her, and she already understood, they could not ignore her mistakes. Such Boards existed to point out to captains that luck, even great good luck, was no substitute for competence.

Warndstadt looked up at her again, this time with one corner of that lean mouth tucked up in what might almost be a smile. “On the other hand, the Board notes that your unorthodox maneuvers resulted in the defeat of an enemy vessel markedly superior in firepower and mass, and the successful defense of Xavier. You seem well aware of your shortcomings as commander of a ship in combat; the Board feels that your character and your deportment are both suitable for command positions in the future, as long as you get the requisite experience first. Few lieutenants junior grade command anything bigger than a shuttle anyway; the Board’s recommendation should have the effect of giving you time to grow into your potential. Now—a complete transcript of the Board’s recommendation will be forwarded to you and your counsel at a later date, should you wish to appeal.”

She would be crazy to appeal; this was the best outcome she could have hoped for.

“Yes, sir,” she said. “Thank you, sir.” She got through the rest of the ritual, the dismissal of the Board and the necessary individual acknowledgement of each member, without being fully aware what she said. She wanted to fall into a bed and sleep for a month . . . but in three days, her court-martial would begin. In the meantime, she had to record her initial statements for the other courts-martial, including Commander Serrano’s.

“Everything’s unusual about this,” Chapin said, as one who disapproved on principle of the unusual. “They had a time finding enough officers to sit on this many different boards and courts at once, and they’re short of space, too. So they’re shuffling people and spaces, and decided that since you’re in such demand they can, after all, accept recorded testimony for some of it. With any luck, you won’t actually have to appear in person in all of them . . . they certainly can’t yank you out of yours just to answer two questions in some other jig’s trial. It rushes you right now, but then your defense is simple anyway.”

“It is?”

“In principle. Were you a conspirator, intending to commit a mutiny? No. Were you a traitor, in the pay of a foreign power? No. Simple. I expect they’ll ask all the awkward questions they can think of, just so it looks good, and in case the original investigators forgot to check . . . but it’s clear to me, and should be clear to them, that you were an ordinary junior officer who reacted to a developing situation—luckily, in the best interests of both Fleet and the Familias Regnant. The only problem I see . . .” He paused, and gave her a long look.

“Yes?” Esmay finally said, when waiting produced nothing but that steady stare.

“It’s going to be difficult to present you as the ordinary junior officer—although your fitness reports support that, putting you right square in the middle of your class—when you became the very unordinary youngest-ever captain to blow away a Benignity heavy cruiser. They’re going to want to know why you were hiding that kind of ability . . . how you hid that kind of ability. Why were you denying Fleet the benefit of your talent?”

“That’s what Admiral Serrano said.” Esmay forced her shoulders back; she wanted to hunch into a little ball.

“And what did you say?”

“I . . . couldn’t answer. I don’t know. I didn’t know I could do it until I did it, and I still find it hard to believe.”

“Such modesty.” Something in the tone chilled her. “I’m your defense counsel, and more than that I’m an attorney with many years of experience—I was in civil practice and Fleet reserves before I went full-time into Fleet. You may be able to fool yourself, young woman, but you don’t fool me. You did what you did because you are unusually capable. Some of that capability showed up on the screening exams you took to get into Fleet in the first place—or had you forgotten your scores?”

She had; she had dismissed them as a fluke when her grades in the Fleet prep school came out only slightly above average.

“I’m now convinced,” Chapin went on, “that you were not hiding your talents for any obvious reason—such as being a Benignity agent—but you were hiding them. You avoided command track as if it had thorns all over it. I pulled your file from prep school and talked to your instructors in the Academy too. They’re all kicking themselves for not noticing, and nurturing, such an obvious talent for command—”

“But I made mistakes,” Esmay said. She could not let this go on. She had been lucky, she had had outstanding senior NCOs who had done most of it . . . she rattled this off as fast as she could, while Chapin sat watching her with the same skeptical expression.

“It won’t do,” he said finally. “For your own good, Lieutenant Suiza—” He had not called her that from the first day; she stiffened. “For your own good,” he repeated more softly. “You must face what you are; you must admit how much of what happened was your doing. Your decisions—good ones. Your ability to take charge, to get that performance from those you commanded. It was no accident. Whether the court dwells on this or not, you must. If you truly did not know what you were capable of—if you didn’t know you were hiding your abilities—then you must figure out why. Otherwise the rest of your life will be one mess after another.” As if she had spoken, his finger came up and leveled at her. “And no, you cannot go back to being just another ordinary junior officer, not after this. Whatever the court decides, reality has decided. You are special. People will expect more, and you’d better learn to handle that.”

Esmay struggled to keep calm. One corner of her mind wondered why it was so hard to believe she was talented; most of it concentrated on the need for control.

The Board, technically considered an administrative and not a judicial procedure, had attracted no media attention, but the multiple courts martial of junior officers involved in a mutiny—and then in the successful defense of Xavier—was too juicy to miss. Fleet kept the defendants isolated as long as it could, but Chapin warned Esmay that politics demanded the courts be open to selected media coverage.

“Usually no one much cares about courts-martial,” he said. “The rare one that has some publicity value is usually kept closed, on the grounds of military necessity. But this case—or rather, all your cases—are unique in Familias history. We’ve had to court-martial groups of officers before—the Trannvis Revolt, for instance—but we’ve never had to court-martial a group that had done something good. That has the newshounds baying for blood . . . not yours, yet, but any blood that happens to hit the ground. And in a situation this complex, someone’s going to bleed.”

Esmay grimaced. “I wish they wouldn’t—”

“Of course. And I don’t want you sitting over the screens keeping track of the media; it will only tie you in knots. But you needed to know before you went in that there will be media there, and they’ll try to get statements from you between sessions, even though they have been told you are forbidden to give them. Just don’t say anything, anything at all, while you’re going from the courtroom to the rooms where you’ll be sequestered between sessions. I don’t have to tell you to keep a composed face; you always do.”

Despite the warning, the mass of video and audio pickups, the competing voices of the media interviewers, were like a blow to the face on her first trip between the defendants’ suite and the courtroom.

“Lieutenant Suiza, is it true that you killed Captain Hearne yourself—?”

“Lieutenant Suiza, just a word about Commander Serrano, please—?”

“There she is—Lieutenant Suiza, how does it feel to be a hero?”

“Lieutenant Suiza, what will your family think about your being court-martialed—?”

She could feel her face settling into a stony mask, but behind that mask she felt helpless, terrified. A murderer? A hero? No, she was a very junior lieutenant who could happily have stayed in obscurity for decades yet. Her family’s opinion of courts-martial . . . she didn’t want to think about that. Mindful of the publicity problem, she had sent only the briefest message to them—and asked them not to reply. She didn’t trust even Fleet ansibles to keep such messages secure under the pressure of every news service in the Familias.

Inside the courtroom, she faced another bank of media pickups. Even as she followed the ritual of the court, she could not fail to be aware that every word, every fleeting expression, would be broadcast across the worlds for all to see. Chapin, waiting at the defense table, muttered “Relax, Lieutenant; you look as if you were about to try the court and not the other way around.”

All the cases were linked by the need for officers to testify about each other’s behavior—because of the need to determine whether the mutiny resulted from a conspiracy. But Esmay, as the senior surviving officer, had been nominally charged with additional violations of the Code. Chapin had emphasized that the charges were required—that he expected a fairly quick dismissal of most of them, given that no evidence supported them. “Unfortunately,” he’d said, “just because Hearne was a traitor doesn’t mean that you mutineers are out of danger: if there’s any evidence that there was a conspiracy to mutiny before there was clear evidence of Hearne’s treachery, then that conspiracy, by itself, is cause for a guilty verdict on that charge.”

But as far as Esmay knew, none of the subordinates not in the pay of the Compassionate Hand had suspected Hearne or the others. She certainly hadn’t. Hearne had seemed a bit slapdash in some ways, but she was rumored to be brilliant in combat, and rumor also linked a mild disregard for “unnecessary” regulations with superior combat ability.

Now she found herself retelling the story of her assignment to Despite all over again. Her duties, her usual routine during time off-duty, her responsibilities to officers even more junior, her evaluation of her peers.

“And you had suspected nothing about Captain Hearne, Major Cossordi, Major Stek, or Lieutenant Arvad?”

“No, sir,” Esmay said. She had said this before, about each one separately.

“And to your knowledge, no one else suspected that they were in the pay of the Benignity?”

“No, sir.”

“Did you have a particular relationship with Dovir?” The idea was so ludicrous that Esmay nearly lost control of her expression.

“Dovir, sir? No, sir.” Silence lengthened; she was tempted to explain Dovir’s preferences in particular companions, and decided better not.

“And you never heard anything of a plot to mutiny against Captain Hearne?”

“No, sir.”

“No grumbling of any sort, from officer or enlisted?”

That was a different matter. Grumbling filled ships as air did; people had grumbled about everything from the food to the shortage of gym slots; people always did. Esmay picked her words with care. “Sir, of course I heard people grumble; they do. But not more than on any other ship.”

A huff of annoyance from one of the officers. “And you have so much experience on so many ships!” he said, dripping sarcasm.

Chapin stood up. “Objection.”

“Sustained.” The chairman gave the speaker a disapproving look. “You are aware of the standards, Thedrun.”

“Sir.”

The chair peered at Esmay. “Please discuss the nature of the grumbling, Lieutenant Suiza. This court is not sure that an inexperienced officer is fully aware of the amount of grumbling that is normal.”

“Yes, sir.” Esmay paused, dragging up from the depths of her memory a few instances. “When Despite was in the yards, before I joined her, the recreation area had been cut by about thirty percent, to allow retrofitting of the enhanced charged beam generator on the portside. That meant losing fifteen of the exercise machines; it would have been nineteen, but Captain Hearne approved a tighter spacing. However, this meant shortening the exercise periods, and some crew could not get their required exercise without getting up on their down shift. Some complained that Hearne should have relaxed the exercise requirements, or installed the other machines elsewhere.”

“What else?”

“Well, there was apparently a sneak thief pilfering from enlisted lockers. That caused a lot of annoyance, because it should have been easy enough to catch, but the scanners never caught anything.”

“They’d been tampered with?”

“Chief Bascome assumed so, but couldn’t prove it. It went on for . . . perhaps twenty or thirty days . . . and then it never happened again. The items taken were rarely of great monetary value, but always personal treasures.” Should she mention that they’d been found after the battle, in the cleanup phase, in the locker of someone killed? Yes; she had been taught that withholding information was the same as lying. “We found the things after the battle,” she said. “But the person whose locker they were in had died in the original fight.”

“The mutiny, you mean.”

“Yes, sir. Under the circumstances, we just gave the stuff back to the owners—the surviving ones, that is.”

A grunt from the chairman, which she could not interpret.

The trial went on, hour after tedious hour. Most of the time the questions made sense, examining what she had known, what she had witnessed, what she had done. Other times the court seemed determined to follow some useless thread of inquiry—like the kinds of grumbling she’d observed—into a thicket where they would lodge until one of them kicked free and returned to the main issues.

One of the side-issues turned nasty. The hectoring Thedrun had continued to ask his questions as if he was sure she was guilty of something dire. He began asking her about her responsibility in regard to supervising the ensigns. “Isn’t it true, Lieutenant Suiza, that you were charged with ensuring that the ensigns carried out their duties and put in the required hours of study?”

“Sir, that duty rotated among the four senior lieutenants junior grade, under the supervision of Lieutenant Hangard. I was assigned that duty for the first thirty days after Despite left Sector HQ, then it devolved onto the next senior, Lieutenant Junior Grade Pelisandre for thirty days, and so on.”

“But as the senior, you were ultimately responsible—?”

“No, sir. Lieutenant Hangard had made it clear that he wished the jig—sorry—”

“Never mind,” the chairman said. “We do know what the word means.”

“Well, then, Lieutenant Hangard wanted the jig in charge of the ensigns to report directly to him. He said we each needed to feel the responsibility alone for a short time.” Where was this leading?

“Then you are not aware that Ensign Arphan was engaged in illegal diversion of military equipment?”

“What!” Esmay couldn’t keep her voice from reacting to that. “Ensign Arphan? But he’s—”

“Ensign Arphan,” the chairman said, “has been convicted of diversion and illegal sale of military goods to unlicensed buyers—in this case, his father’s shipping company.”

“I . . . it’s hard to believe,” Esmay said. On second thought, she could believe it, but still . . . why hadn’t she noticed? How had someone else found out?

“You haven’t answered the question: were you or were you not aware that Ensign Arphan had illegally diverted military equipment?”

“No, sir, I was not aware of that.”

“Very well. Now, about the mutiny itself—” Esmay wondered why they bothered to ask questions which the surveillance cubes had already answered. Hearne had attempted to destroy all the records of her conversation with Serrano, but the mutiny erupted before she could. So the court had seen the playbacks, from several angles . . . for Serrano had of course recorded Hearne’s transmissions, and the transmissions agreed.

What seemed to worry the court most was the possibility that the junior officers had been plotting even before Hearne defied Serrano. Esmay repeated her earlier statements, and they picked them apart. How was it possible that she had not known Hearne was a traitor before? How was it possible that she had been party to a successful mutiny, if she had not been involved in some plan with the other mutineers ahead of time? Was it really that easy to produce a spontaneous mutiny?

By the end of the second day, Esmay wanted to bang heads. She found it hard to believe that a whole row of senior officers were so incapable of recognizing what lay in front of them—so insistent on finding something other than the plain, obvious truth. Hearne had been a traitor, along with a few others of the officers and some of the enlisted. No one had noticed because, up until the moment she defied Serrano, her actions had not been suspicious.

“You never had any suspicion that she was using illicit pharmaceuticals?” one of them asked for the third time.

“No, sir,” Esmay said. She had said that before. Captain Hearne had never appeared under the influence, not that Esmay would have been able to recognize subtle effects of drugs . . . even if she’d seen that much of Hearne. Esmay had no way to know what she was taking. Nor had she investigated Hearne’s cabin after the mutiny to find out. She had had a battle to fight.

More questions followed, on Hearne’s motivation; Major Chapin cut those off repeatedly. Esmay was glad to sit and let him handle it; she felt stale and grumpy as well as tired. Of course she didn’t know why Hearne might have turned traitor; of course she didn’t know if Hearne had been in debt, had had political connections to a foreign government, had harbored some grievance against Fleet. How could she?

Her own motivations came into question; Esmay answered as calmly as she could. She had harbored no grievance against Captain Hearne, who had spoken to her only a few times. When Hearne’s private log came into evidence, she found that Hearne had described Lieutenant Junior Grade Suiza as “competent but colorless; causes no trouble, but lacks initiative.”

“Do you feel you lack initiative?” asked the board chair.

Esmay considered this. Were they hoping she’d say yes, or no? What hook did they plan to hang her on? “Sir, I’m sure Captain Hearne had reason to think that. It is my habit to be cautious, to be sure I understand the situation fully before stating an opinion. I was, therefore, not the first to offer solutions or suggestions when the captain posed a problem.”

“You didn’t resent her opinion?”

“No,” Esmay said. “I thought she was right.”

“And you were satisfied with that?”

“Sir, I was not satisfied with myself, but the captain’s opinion seemed fair.”

“I notice you use the past tense . . . do you still feel the captain’s evaluation of you was accurate?”

“Objection,” Chapin said quickly. “Lieutenant Suiza’s present self-evaluation and its comparison to Captain Hearne’s prior evaluation is not an issue.”

At last it wound down . . . all the evidence given, all the questions asked and asked again, all the arguments made by opposing counsel. Esmay waited while the officers conferred; in the reverse of the Board procedures, she stayed in the courtroom while the members withdrew.

“Take a long breath,” Chapin said. “You’re looking pale again . . . but you did very well.”

“It seemed so . . . so complicated.”

“Well, if they let it look as simple as it is, they’d have no good reason for a trial, except that it’s the regulations. With all the media coverage, they don’t want to make it look easy; they want it to look as if they were thorough and demanding.”

“Can you tell—?”

“How it will come out? If they don’t acquit you of all charges, I’ll be very surprised . . . they have the Board report; they know you’ve been chewed on about mistakes. And if they don’t acquit, we’ll appeal—that’ll be easier, actually, out from under the media’s many eyes. Besides, they found themselves a bad apple to squash, that young Arphan fellow.”

The officers returned, and Esmay stood, heart beating so that she could scarcely breathe. What would it be?

“Lieutenant Junior Grade Esmay Suiza, it is the decision of this court that you are innocent of all charges made against you; this court has voted unanimously for acquittal. Congratulations, Lieutenant.”

“Thank you, sir.” She managed to stay on her feet during the final ceremonies, which again included greeting each officer on the court, and the prosecuting counsel, who—now that he wasn’t badgering her with questions—seemed friendly and harmless.

“I knew we didn’t have a chance,” he said, shaking her hand. “It was obvious from the evidence, really, but we had to go through with it. Unless you’d come in here blind drunk and assaulted an admiral, you were safe enough.”

“I didn’t feel safe,” Esmay said.

He laughed. “Then I did my job, Lieutenant. That’s what I’m supposed to do, scare the defendant into admitting every scrap of guilt. You just didn’t happen to have any.” He turned to Chapin. “Fred, why do you always get the easy ones? The last fellow I had to defend was a mean-minded SOB who’d been blackmailing recruits.”

“I’m rewarded for my virtues,” Chapin said blandly, and they both laughed. Esmay didn’t feel like joining in; she felt like finding a quiet place to sleep for a week.

“What’ll you do now, Lieutenant?” asked one of the other officers.

“Take some leave,” she said. “They said it’d be awhile before they had a new assignment for me, and I could have thirty days home leave plus travel. I haven’t been home since I left.” She wasn’t that anxious to go home, but she knew no other way to escape the media attention.