So now Geary paused, thinking. A way existed to avoid moving up the date of the fleet’s departure despite that explicit order from Celu. Or a way had once existed, anyway. He called up fleet regulations, searching for the right phrase, and smiled when it popped up. Ultimate responsibility for the safety of ships and personnel, and for successful completion of assigned tasks and missions, rests with the commanding officer. It is the duty of the commander to take into account all potential factors when implementing orders.
Over a century ago, Geary and his fellow officers had called that the “you’re screwed” regulation. Obey an order when some of “all potential factors” might have made obedience unwise, and it was the fault of the commander in the field. Disobey an order when some of “all potential factors” made such disobedience wrong, and that was also the fault of the commander in the field. He shouldn’t have even wondered that a regulation designed to shield higher authority from fault would have been removed at any point.
But he could use it against higher authority. He could respond to these orders with a very detailed report laying out all of the potential factors that justified what he believed to be a necessary delay in beginning the mission. More repairs, more supplies to be brought in, crew members on leave who wouldn’t be reporting back early unless emergency recalls were sent out. Drafting such a justification would require his full attention for at least a day, and there would be no guarantee that anyone at headquarters would read beyond the executive summary at the beginning and no guarantee that headquarters would pay attention to any arguments contradicting its own chosen version of reality.
But he couldn’t lie, either. A Potemkin fleet might be all well and good when dealing with purely administrative matters, but lying about the fleet’s readiness status and when it was leaving on a mission would be criminally deceptive.
All potential factors. New officers used to complain that there was no way to describe all potential factors, and we’d laugh and tell them that was the whole idea of the regulation. All . . . Potential . . . Factors.
I’ve never really taken advantage of being Black Jack, the popular hero. But I’ve never liked people like Celu. And I have a lot of other things I should be doing besides justifying my decisions to a bunch of bureaucrats at headquarters. I will not screw the crew members who are taking leave now and earned that leave in plenty of battles. Nor will I rush a mission that requires substantial preparation.
There wasn’t much I could do about this kind of thing before. But they need me in command of this fleet. And, by regulations, I have ultimate responsibility for deciding what to do here. I just have to justify my decision.
He carefully composed a text reply. In response to your message (reference a), per fleet regulation 0215 paragraph six alpha, I am required to take into account all potential factors in carrying out orders. The current projected departure date on my assigned mission reflects my assessment of all potential factors, including but not limited to the time necessary to meet essential logistics, readiness, repair, personnel, and planning requirements. Justification for this assessment and delineation of all potential factors is contained herein (attachment b).
He had offered no give on his chosen departure date, though that was slightly hidden in a nicely vague, politely worded, and deceptively brief message containing no real information. The information would be taken care of by the attachment. They want all possible factors? I’ll let them read through everything to see if they can find any grounds for saying my decision isn’t justified.
Geary instructed the fleet database to copy every official file it held on any subject (though he did exempt anything related to the Potemkin fleet simulation) and drop the entire collection into a single folder to attach to his message. The fleet’s massed computing power, every warship linked into a single networked system, chugged away at that one task for several minutes. He hadn’t imagined it was possible for any task to take that long for the fleet’s systems to handle and was wondering if he had somehow managed to crash the network when the result finally flashed onto his screen.
Geary paused then, awed by the sheer magnitude of the resulting attachment to his message. The mass of information was so huge that it would probably give even a black hole indigestion.
That made him wonder what would happen when all of that information got dumped into headquarters databases already renowned for their musty size and scale. Could a large enough mass of information result in a collapse into a virtual black hole of degenerate information from which nothing could escape? If the result meant that headquarters would have trouble sending out more messages, it was certainly worth a try.
He took another look at Celu’s image, thinking of her order to respond quickly, then gave his reply the highest nonemergency priority. You asked for a reply as soon as possible. You’re going to get it.
Could a single courier ship even carry that much data? It would be interesting to find out and interesting to see how long it would tie up headquarters just downloading the attachment. Smiling, Geary tapped the command to send the message, then went back to work.
HE usually only quickly scanned headquarters messages after that, seeing whether they needed a vague reply or could just be ignored or perhaps actually required action. But two weeks into his command, a very odd message came in, one that made him pause and read through it. Identify for transfer on a high-priority basis all fleet personnel, officer and enlisted, with formal or informal expertise on workings of hypernet systems. Personnel so identified are to remain at Varandal until reassigned. Transfer? Yanking experienced crew members off ships about to head out for a perilous mission—Wait a minute. Wait a damned flipping minute.
He didn’t know how many personnel in the fleet qualified as having “formal or informal expertise” when it came to the hypernet, but he knew that one of them was Commander Neeson, commanding officer of the battle cruiser Implacable. He was supposed to identify for transfer a veteran commanding officer two weeks before leaving, then leave that officer behind when the fleet departed? How many other critical personnel would be covered by this latest demand from fleet headquarters?
A quick search of the fleet database popped up a long list of names, almost one hundred men and women, officers and senior enlisted, who had been assigned secondary codes for hypernet-related skills. Aside from Neeson, four others were commanding officers, including Captain Hiyakawa of the battle cruiser Steadfast and the captains of two heavy cruisers. But as far as he could tell from reviewing the skill code criteria, hypernet expertise was an ill-defined area. Checking the primary skill codes of the senior enlisted, which by contrast were well-defined, Geary shook his head in disbelief. I can’t afford to let these people go. Not many of them. Not any of them if I have any say in it. Why the hell does headquarters need them?
He called Commander Neeson, whom he had worked with before on hypernet issues. “Commander, how big an impact would you have on any Alliance research or development or building project concerning the hypernet?”
Three light seconds distant on his ship, Neeson seemed startled by the question. “You mean, me, personally, Admiral? Not much. None, really. I know some things about the hypernet, theory and practice, but nothing compared to real experts. I know of at least a half dozen officers at headquarters who could run rings around me when it comes to hypernet matters. We haven’t talked, but I’ve seen their names on research papers.”