Polaris Sector, Battleship Singularity
They hadn’t bound his hands, but it took every bit of Captain Merlyn’s self-control not to wrest himself free of the lead Marine’s iron grip. The man’s fingers dug sharply into his shoulder despite the thickness of his blue Captain’s jacket. It was not quite painful, merely a constant reminder of their control as they marched him deeper into the ship.
“Where are you taking me?” Merlyn asked.
“Conference room,” the Marine holding him replied. “We ‘ave some questions for you.”
The man had an accent that Merlyn couldn’t place. Some kind of Terran, he assumed, but not any of the words that he frequented on his trade routes – or used to frequent, Merlyn supposed, since his life was now upended. “What kind of questions?” he cautiously inquired.
The Marines looked to each other uneasily, then checked the corridors around them. No one else was in sight, so they nodded to the one holding Merlyn. As if that exchange didn’t make the Captain uneasy enough, the one behind him readjusted his grip to be even tighter. “Captain Merlyn, when was the last time you saw Admiral Gives?”
“The Adjunct meeting,” Merlyn answered, uncertain why that would be relevant.
“You’re certain that was the last time you saw ‘im?” the Marine asked, shoving Merlyn into the left corridor at the junction.
“Yes, and mind you, I’ve got some questions for him the next time I see him.” Merlyn fully intended to give the man a piece of his mind for what had been done to the Badger.
The Marines did a decent job of concealing their expressions, but by the slight way they tensed, Merlyn knew he’d given the wrong answer. Their silence spoke in equal volumes, as did the tight hand on his shoulder, and after a moment, the realization dawned on him like a computer slow to start. Wait a moment. “You don’t know where he is, do you?” Merlyn almost had it in him to laugh at the absurdity. “You lost your commanding officer.” They were on a ship, isolated in the middle of nowhere, galactically speaking, and the Marines had managed to lose him.
Still, the silence lingered, and humor quickly fled Merlyn as he remembered the way they had patted him down. They’d been looking for weapons. “Wait, you don’t think I had anything to do with it, do you?”
“We are going to determine that, Captain Merlyn,” the lead Marine said, dead serious.
Oh, Stars. “I didn’t do anything! You can’t seriously believe that I could overpower his guard? I’m a civilian transport sailor – have been my whole life. I have only rudimentary self-defense training. It wouldn’t help me if I got hijacked, let alone into a fight with a trained Marine.” Merlyn severely doubted he could kill anyone on this ship. Training or not, he wasn’t sure he could stomach it.
The female Marine beside him turned. “LC, he’s telling the truth. I don’t think he’s our man.”
Lieutenant Colonel Pflum had learned to heed Blosse’s observations. She was almost never wrong when she chose to voice them, but Pflum still couldn’t turn the man in his grip loose. Not until the Admiral was found.
Merlyn was ecstatic to see someone vouch for his innocence. “She’s right! I didn’t do anything.” Desperately, he tried to stall their walk. “This is pointless! I would never be able to overpower the guard.”
Pflum shoved him onward, “Then I guess it’s a good thing the Admiral refuses an honor guard aboard this ship.”
“He does what?” Merlyn cried. “What kind of flag officer would deny that?”
“The kind that can defend himself,” Pflum answered.
“Which would imply that I couldn’t hurt him, even if I wanted to,” Merlyn countered, anxious to prove his innocence. He knew how these instances worked. On a military ship, he wasn’t guaranteed the right to trial. If the Admiral was dead, then his guilt would be determined by the Admiral’s replacement, impartial or not. He’d heard tales of bystanders being hung as scapegoats in mutinies. “I’m innocent!”
“We’ll be the judge of that, Captain Merlyn.” In Pflum’s mind, it was entirely possible Merlyn had been armed. If that were the case, then a bit of surprise could have turned the fight his way, as the Admiral didn’t normally carry a weapon. As the one responsible for the security of the ship, and additionally, for the safety of the man who had been the Fleet Admiral, Gives’ habits stressed him beyond belief. Hell, Pflum knew the Admiral had helped thin and gray the hair of every security officer he'd ever served with. The position’s only saving grace that that the Admiral didn’t usually allow guests on his ship, nor did he often leave.
Merlyn had no choice but to let the marines drag him onward, jaw clenched in anxiety and frustration. He had defended the Admiral in that meeting with the fleet leaders, despite the horrible taste it left in his mouth and the painful memories it forced him to face. Still, he had done it, because it had been the right thing to do. Now, he was the lead suspect in the possibility of the man’s murder.
However, while the Marines escorting Merlyn seemed serious, they didn’t seem extremely worried. Merlyn had the distinct impression this had happened before, but what kind of officer made a habit of disappearing?
Merlyn was soon to find out.
As his party rounded a corner to a familiar corridor, the Marines stopped cold, unintentionally jostling him.
Admiral Gives stood in front of the conference room, hands folded behind his back, as if he’d been calmly waiting for someone he knew would arrive. But the surprise on the Marines’ faces told Merlyn otherwise.
“Admiral,” the Marine holding Merlyn recovered first. “With all due respect, where the fuck ‘ave you been?”
“I am not required to answer that, Lieutenant Colonel, and I am not aware of any current emergencies, so I fail to see the relevance.” If he hadn’t been needed, why should it matter where he’d been?
Merlyn could hear the older Marine curse under his breath, “Stubborn bastard an ‘is mysterious damn ‘abits.” This had definitely happened before.
Still, the Marine quickly hardened his composure, “Sir, you’ve been MIA for nearly eight hours. We had to consider foul play.” If they had known his condition, it would have been different, but with the man straight missing, they had to do their due diligence in case the worse turned out to be true.
Yes, I shudder to think that a fully-equipped battleship with a talented, fully-trained crew could somehow survive without my reassurance for eight hours before beginning a witch hunt, the Admiral annoyedly mused. Outwardly, he kept his calm, noticing Merlyn’s discomfort as he was caught between his and Pflum’s familiar debate. “Release Captain Merlyn,” he ordered the Marine.
Merlyn felt the hand disappear from his shoulder at once, but the argument wasn’t over. “Admiral,” Pflum said, “we could avoid these misunderstandings if you would accept a Marine guard.”
“I will not entertain this debate, LC.” It was stupid. “I have lived and worked aboard this ship for more than thirty years. I am in no danger aboard her decks.” Simply put, he knew this ship better than anyone. As evidenced, he could simply choose to disappear and not be found.
Lieutenant Colonel Pflum sighed. Stars, this is frustrating. He could feel the gazes of Merlyn and the Marine unit he’d brought with him, watching the exchange bounce back and forth. “Admiral, for the sake of the stars, you are probably the most wanted man in the entire worlds right now. The central government wants you dead for running off with a battleship. The Frontier wants to interrogate you until you spill military secrets. There’s an AI eager to dissect your brain, and the damn Erans just want to kill you on account of your personality.” And, at the moment, they weren’t the only ones. “Bloody ‘ell, mate, the people on this ship are probably the only ones invested in keeping you alive, so it’d be really ‘elpful if you would let us do that.”
It was safe guess that Pflum was fired up because the after-action reports had come in from Malweh and Callie. It wasn’t exactly normal for a ship’s commanding officer to engage hostile boarding forces. The commander generally stayed on the bridge until the ship was secure. There was no doubt that what he’d done had been dangerous. Pflum definitely thought him reckless. But, if he hadn’t allowed the ghost to redirect him from the bridge, Malweh and Callie would be dead. “Recent events would dictate that I can defend myself just fine.” For some officers, that definitely wasn’t true, but he’d had no choice other than to hone his combat skills through the years.
Pflum crossed his arms. “Your skill won’t ‘elp you if you refuse to carry a weapon.”
“Last time we had this debate, LC, you challenged me to prove it. Remind me how that ended?”
Pflum pursed his lips as he heard the younger Marines chuckle at his expense. He glared at the Admiral. You are so irritating. “This debate is not over.”
“Yes, it is,” the Admiral countered. They both knew the mention of Pflum’s previous challenge ended it. “I do not need a guard aboard this ship. Off of it, I will seek the expertise of you and your Marines when necessary. That is our arrangement. It is not negotiable.” He was well capable of shaking an unwanted guard anyway. “I appreciate your diligence, Marines. You are dismissed.”
“Yes, sir,” all except Pflum said. He just stubbornly glared, but turned and left with the rest of them.
Merlyn had grown comfortable during the debate. Their disagreement had made him invisible, but he was suddenly very exposed once the Marines left. Still, the Admiral didn’t hesitate. He didn’t even take a noticeable moment to look Merlyn over. “I apologize for my crew’s overreaction, Captain. However, I do believe this allows us a unique opportunity to discuss matters privately.”
Merlyn felt his stomach plummet into his feet. Was this finally the moment that the Admiral addressed his broken vow of silence about the Anti-Corporation Control Rebellion? Merlyn would rather talk about anything other than that.
“Come,” the Admiral said, betraying no intent as he led Merlyn into the conference room. “I am sure you would like to discuss what was done to your ship.”
That’s what this is about? A wave of relief swept over him, allowing him to draw a deeper, more fulfilling breath, but it turned hot in his lungs as he remembered the sight of uninvited technicians crawling all over his ship. “Damn straight, I’d like a word about that!” he fumed, “You do not have the right to alter my ship.”
As he sat again at the head of the table, the Admiral glanced up calmly, “Were the alterations not to your benefit?”
“That’s not the point!” Merlyn argued. “The Badger is my ship! You didn’t have the right!” Rules and custody disregarded, it was a matter of respect between two captains and their ships. “How would you feel if I started yanking off bulkheads and rewiring your damned ship?”
The Admiral was perfectly calm, as if observing Merlyn’s frustration from another realm, but a level of frost crept into his words, “I would strongly advise you not to do that.”
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“So, you can deal it out, but not take it?” Merlyn scoffed. How predictable.
“Step off your high horse, Captain. I gave those orders without asking your permission because I knew you would refuse those modifications.” He could read Merlyn’s indignation. Truly, one sailor to another, he understood Merlyn’s pride. Still, “Had I not intervened, the Badger would have been at high risk of a life support failure in a few weeks.” As a cargo transport, Merlyn’s ship had been ill-equipped to handle that many passengers in the long term. “I understand that we have a history, Captain, and you may not like it, but I made that decision on account of your passengers.”
“A history?” Merlyn couldn’t help the bitter laugh that escaped his lips as he turned away, unable tolerate looking at the man. He studied the room around him instead. The perfect humaneness of it just made him sick. That fake potted plant in the corner was too damn innocent. It didn’t belong here, not aboard this ship, not next to that monster. “I lost everything because of you, and you? You just walked away like it never happened.” A man of power, the repercussions had never touched him. “Do you know how many people lost their lives in that day? How many people you murdered?”
“3,784.”
The answer was quiet, but it was as calm as any that had come before it. “So, you do know. You just don’t care.”
“I had my orders, Captain.” At that moment, they had been ironclad.
“And yet you disobeyed those orders to spare the Titanica, as if you couldn’t have taken a stand anytime before that.” He could have spared every life in orbit, had he been so inclined. “But no. Too afraid to lose your power, your ship, you massacred them.” In Merlyn’s eyes, he was an example of everything wrong with these worlds.
“I had my reasons, Captain Merlyn.”
“Reasons to become the most hated man in the worlds? Reasons to turn your own ship into a thing of such fear that people truly believe it to be the carcass of some arcane demon?” Merlyn shook his head. “No, there’s no reason for that.”
“Dead men tell no tales, Captain.” An old sailors’ adage, it was true nonetheless.
“So, what are you trying to hide?” Merlyn shot back.
Admiral Gives held back a sigh. The problem with humanity was that everyone had their angle, their filter. They only saw things the way they wanted to, and rarely ever the entire truth. “If I left corpses and wreckage behind without failure, Captain, would there be anyone to speak of the deed? Would there be anyone left to spread the hate?” The reality of the matter was that acts of mercy had solidified the Singularity’s reputation. It was the survivors they left behind that retold and resolidified the Singularity’s gruesome legend.
“You’re sick.” Who the hell thought in those terms?
Merlyn’s deflection was a poor defense, but the Admiral could hardly blame him. No one wanted to contemplate that argument, no matter how true it was. “I know nothing I do will ever truly earn your trust or forgiveness, Captain. That was never my objective. We both know that everyone in these worlds has their own intentions.”
Yes, Merlyn knew, they do. But not everyone had a fleet of several thousand souls resting on the unlikely scenario that their intentions were good. “What is it you plan to do here?” What were these ships and people to him?
“My intentions are none of your concern,” the Admiral stated simply. His overall objectives did not involve the Badger or any other member of the fleet. They were all mere complications. However, he read the distrust in Merlyn’s expression with ease. “I do believe that if I meant you any harm, you would well know by now, Captain.” No matter if he’d forced Merlyn’s hand in it, upgrading and resupplying the Badger was a gesture of undeniable good will.
The Admiral spoke so easily, so calmly, as if he were reading his words from a script. And maybe he was. This man had been fed to the press to give more than his share of insincere apologies for the fleet’s crimes on the Frontier. “You disgust me,” Merlyn felt nothing but repulsed by this officer’s presence. The Admiral’s detached demeanor made it clear enough that he didn’t truly care about the fleet. It was subtle, but he acted differently with the crew present. He had more depth, more humanity to him then. Them gone, he may as well have been a useless automaton, programmed for a task its movements were too rigid to complete.
Feeling the nicks of the conference table’s rough wood beneath his fingertips, the Admiral was well aware Merlyn resented his calm. However, it was a simple fact that Merlyn would resent a lack of calm even more. “You hate me for what I did during the Anti-Corporation Control Rebellion. That is your right.” It was more than justified. He may have spared the Titanica, but he’d gunned down a hundred other ships. “However, we are both aware that is not the only reason you hate me.” Their paths had crossed more than once before. “There is a reason you became my crew’s primary suspect when your history with the protests against Knight Industries is not public knowledge.”
Merlyn felt his stomach plummet once more. As much as he didn’t want to discuss the protests, this was worse. He let his gaze fall to the gold ring on his finger, and balled his hands, feeling it bite into the flesh. Of course, he knows, he told himself. That information would be in his records.
“Our lives have not been so different, Captain-”
“No.” Merlyn balled his fists even tighter. “You don’t get to say that. You don’t get to bring that up.” There may be a reason he’d taken those orphans aboard at Sagittarion, but that was his business. “I am nothing like you.” Merlyn had never killed anyone. He’d never committed a massacre, just been unlucky enough to know the victims.
“And yet, we both now serve as protectors of things we can never have.” Merlyn protected those orphans for the same reason the Admiral defended his crew.
“I am not like you.” Merlyn was certain of few things, save that. “You are a monster.” He abused his power and brought nothing but suffering. Though he may have dirtied his hands once or twice directly, Merlyn refused to believe that the Admiral was anything more than a coward. Even he couldn’t have killed those families on the Yokohoma with his bare hands, so he’d cowered behind his warship’s guns.
The mere thought of it bound Merlyn’s chest in heated anger. It became more and more difficult to breathe, to think. How could he stand in the same room as the man that had sunk the Yokohoma and do nothing? He had the opportunity to avenge the wrongful deaths of so many. He had the opportunity to avenge his family.
Before logic could catch up with him, Merlyn started across the room. “You. You have taken everything from me.” Including, now, the independence of his ship. “You do not deserve to live.” It was all Merlyn could feel, all he could think. This man deserved the same fate he’d forced upon so many: a terrifying, painful death without hope or meaning. That dominated Merlyn’s mind as he grabbed two fistfuls of the Admiral’s uniform and threw him into the wall with unexpected ease. The dull thud was music to his ears. “Don’t you ever set foot aboard my ship.” He slammed the man into the wall again with all his strength, hating the mere suggestion that they were at all similar. “Don’t you ever so much as look at those kids. They will not become the Prince’s victims.”
Fists quaking, and thoughts blurred, he bashed the Admiral into the wall again, deaf to his heaving gasps. “I should never have defended you in that meeting,” Merlyn spat, dropping him to the floor. “I should have told them what you really are. The monster. The killer. The coward. You were too weak to stand on Command’s side, but were too gutless to take their victims’. Now you’re on neither, a broken casualty of your own history.” The irony of it was bittersweet.
“These worlds hate you. This fleet hates you. I hate you.” Merlyn couldn’t stop himself from leveling a kick at the man’s gut. It crushed him painfully against the wall, feeling so well-deserved. The Admiral coughed, but he stayed where he’d fallen on the scuffed floor. There wasn’t an ounce of fight in him. “Predictable.” Those who cowered behind the strength of the worlds’ war machines were weak on their own, the great Steel Prince no exception.
This violence was so easy. There was no argument, no fight. The long-awaited release of the anger in his chest made Merlyn laugh, until a heaving whisper reminded him, “I told you we were not so different.”
And that was all it took for that barking, bitter laugh of bottled pain to morph into hacking cries, then into unintelligible sobs, realizing he’d become his enemy. He’d become the one who sought that violence because it was so, so easy. Because it felt so, so satisfying.
All Merlyn could do was run. Run from that realization. The deck shuddered under his footfalls, and soon enough, the hatch to the conference room slammed closed. The Admiral just laid there for a moment, catching his beath. And people wonder why I prefer to avoid physical contact.
“Admiral!” the ghost appeared above him, brows furrowed with concern. “Are you damaged?”
“Not permanently,” he answered, pushing himself up with a groan. He settled up against the bulkheads, short of breath, ribs aching. The conference room was spinning a bit, and he wasn’t sure if it was shortness of breath or a fresh concussion.
The Admiral said nothing else, just settled against the cool metal of the bulkheads. It comforted him from the darkness amongst his thoughts. She watched him rub his head. He wouldn’t express it, and didn’t show it on his face, but she knew him well enough to know he was in physical pain, and yet, that was not what he sought comfort from. Merlyn’s words had been harsh, too harsh a reminder of the past. It was enough to rile a spark of anger, so she darkened her tone, unusually serious, “What do you want me to do with him?” There were so many ways to arrange an accident aboard ship. For her, it was so, so incredibly easy.
The answer was quiet. Distant. “Nothing.”
“But-”
“Stand down,” he said. “It’s fine.” He’d gone poking at memories he shouldn’t have. After all, he was to blame for the fate of Merlyn’s family. “I deserved that.”
“No, you didn’t.” Merlyn had no idea what had happened. “That’s not fair.”
“Life isn’t fair.” That was a simple fact. “It may not have been my choice, but what happened to the Yokohoma was still my responsibility.”
“No.” Absolutely not. “That was Brent’s fault.” That psychopath had done this.
“I could have stopped him,” the Admiral said dully, a painful cough following the words as he tried to ignore his quickly growing headache. “I should have stopped him.” And yet, Brent had gotten away with it, the way he always did. “Merlyn is right about me.” In a way, they were all right about him. He didn’t function as he should. He was broken.
“Admiral…” she said, softening her voice. “That’s not true. It’s not.”
“They hate me, and they are right to.” He couldn’t fault anyone for that. He’d done horrible things, the worst of which may be yet to come.
“But, I don’t hate you.” Slowly, she knelt down, level to where he now sat. “This crew doesn’t hate you.” True, they weren’t always sure what to make of him and his actions, but none of them, not even Malweh, really hated him. “And no matter how much Merlyn hates you, how much any of them hate you, that doesn’t give them the right to hurt you. You taught me that.” He should have defended himself against Merlyn, but she well knew why he hadn’t. He saw that physical abuse as payment for his sins. Once, she had thought the same way about Brent’s mental abuse. The Admiral had put an immediate stop to that, but now that their roles were switched, she couldn’t do the same. This illusionary form simply wasn’t real enough to intervene.
For a long moment, they sat. She took in the details that others never noticed: the way his recently burned had trembled a bit, the pained shudder his breath took from bruised ribs, that old, thin scar on his neck. He had the look of someone who’d been through a lot, maybe even too much, caught in this moment of vulnerability. The truth about Sam weighed on him. He’d deny it, but she knew it did, the same as she knew he’d never kill anyone in self-defense. He didn’t consider his life worth it. You go out of your way to help me, and yet… Yet, here he was. There was little she could do; little she had ever managed to do for him.
“Look at me,” she finally said, waiting until he turned to see her certainty. “Next time, defend yourself. That is my order, soldier. Next time, you protect yourself.”
A light came to his eyes, amused by the absurdity of this machine bound in subservience giving him an order, but still, he answered, “Yes, ma’am.” She always knew what to say, the only one he truly counted on to always be there. “Do you think I’m making a mistake?” he asked, allowing her to take the specifics of the question from his thoughts.
Given what he’d planned for Captain Merlyn, “No. He will be an acceptable choice for the logicality of the task, though I am concerned that his personal feelings may get in the way.” Merlyn’s hatred was powerful, the reasons so clearly defined in his mind. It was the feel of someone who had lived their life knowing who was at fault for his loss. “Does it not concern you that he may refuse to reach out to us because he is too loyal and fears your intentions?”
“He might.” That was a valid concern. “But I know someone who could force his hand.” The Admiral pulled himself off the floor. “I believe it’s time Ron Parker and I had a conversation.”
“You trust him enough to send him onto the Badger?” That in itself was a peculiarity. Generally, the Admiral trusted no one, save her.
“I trust that he wants to keep his daughter alive.” That motivation was easy enough to exploit. “His attraction to Amelia doesn’t hurt either.” Parker could be trusted to act in line with their protection, and that made him useful enough. “Placed aboard the Badger, if there was danger, he would force Merlyn to contact us.” As a Marine, he would know what a battleship’s protection was worth.
The ghost frowned, “You’re turning Amelia, Harrison, Anabelle and Ron over to the Badger?”
“Yes.” Given the Badger’s upgraded life support, the ship could now easily sustain four more passengers, though the quarters would be cramped. “There is a high possibility that we will be forced into combat.” Gathering supplies for the fleet would likely not be a peaceful endeavor. “I will not carry unwilling civilian passengers into combat, let alone children.”
“I understand,” she said softly. That was the logical course of action. Their civilian passengers would be safer outside the line of fire. Still, it saddened her. She would miss the children. The way they saw this struggle as black and white was calming, even if she knew it was not so simple.
She looked sorrowful, as if this news was a final goodbye to Ron, Amelia and the kids. It was hardly surprising that she’d gotten attached. She grew attached to most who came aboard for any duration of time. “We will see them again,” he assured her.
Unwilling to contemplate the dark future that awaited her, she simply nodded.