“Thanks,” I said, dryly. “What do I do now?”
“You remember what I told you,” he said. “It’ll keep you alive.”
Chapter Eight
The UNPF promotion system, put simply, is a mess. Officers are promoted after what is supposed to be a careful reading of their service record, followed by interviews with their commanding officers, but it is quite common for complete incompetents to be promoted to quite senior positions. Every service record must praise the officer to the skies. A single blemish in the wrong place can utterly destroy a career. The political officers assigned to starships, rather than commanding officers, make the final recommendations. These are almost always acted upon. Competence is a leaf when weighed against the stone of political reliability.
“So,” Jason Montgomerie said, over a cup of synthesised coffee, “how do you feel about your first year on active service?”
I tensed, despite myself. It had been a year since I had boarded the Jacques Delors for the first time and in some ways I wished I had never known what it would be like to serve on a starship. There hadn’t been another interception of people trying to escape the UN’s insatiable demands for their service, but there had been enough other incidents to leave me in no doubt what I served. Part of me was tempted to tell the Political Officer the truth, knowing that I would never be allowed to serve on a starship again, but the rest of me held fast. I didn’t dare speak the truth.
“I think it went fairly well,” I said, carefully. I’d seen the Political Officer from time to time — we were meant to have regular indoctrination sessions as young officers, but most of them had been skipped under the pressure of the starship’s patrol route — but never on my own. Up close, he looked more of a harmless sot than anything else, like one of the Persons of No Residence from home. They drank to forget their woes. It had occurred to me, not for the first time, that Jason Montgomerie might have more in common with them than either would have cared to admit. “It was an adventure, sir.”
My enthusiasm wasn’t quite feigned. The Senior Chief had been right. I had never been fully tested until I’d boarded the starship and discovered that the universe didn’t care how politically reliable you were. I hadn’t been worthy to wear Ensign’s rank, or even a Crewman’s uniform, but now I felt much more confident in myself. The Senior Chief, the Marines and even the Captain himself had taught me far more than the Academy, even if I hadn’t ended up First Ensign. That honour had gone to Roger and, despite his family connections, I had to admit that he’d earned it.
“Excellent,” the Political Officer said. He took another sip of his own coffee. I caught a whiff of the smell and realised that it was spiked with something else. There was supposed to be only one still on board — under the care of the Senior Chief — but I wouldn’t have been surprised to discover that there was another one. The Political Officer drank far more than anyone else. “And your adventure with the fleeing criminals? How do you feel about that?”
I kept my face blank. “I felt as if I’d caught fugitives from justice,” I said, untruthfully. I still wanted to throw up every time I thought of it. The mere thought of what I’d been party to, if only by accident…it was disgusting. The Senior Chief had briefed me carefully, however; I was to pretend to be delighted at my own work. “They fled lawful orders from Earth and had to be detained.”
“Of course,” the Political Officer agreed. He smiled down into his coffee for a long moment. “And your own career has benefited because of it. Your name is on the list for promotion at the end of this voyage.”
I blinked. The Senior Chief had hinted at the possibility, but it hadn’t really sunk in, not when I still felt like an incompetent jackass half the time. I’d learned more about how the Peace Force really worked than when I’d been a young Cadet, but I couldn’t quite believe that the Promotion Board would consider me a serious prospect for higher rank. Roger, perhaps, or Muna…but not me.
“Ah…thank you, sir,” I said, tightly. The Senior Chief had made one thing very clear. If promotion was being offered, I was not to decline it. They would never offer to promote me again. “May I ask why…?”
“Certainly,” the Political Officer said. “The reports from the Lieutenants have all been very favourable about you, John. You have mastered the requirements of an Ensign’s role and studied the basic requirements for a Lieutenant, including logistics and crew support. They were very impressed with you. You may never make a Security Officer, or a Doctor, but you’re certainly on the command track.”
His eyes narrowed slightly. “Unless, of course, you don’t want it?”
“I do,” I said, quickly. I wanted to be a commanding officer, like Captain Harriman, not a pen-pusher on a base somewhere or a Lieutenant who would never rise above Lieutenant. I’d met both types now on the cruise, and on the handful of bases we had been allowed shore leave — thankfully, none as bad as Terra Nova — and I didn’t want to be either. A Lieutenant without career prospects became embittered very quickly. “Sir, I’m flattered that…”
“Think nothing of it,” the Political Officer said, waving one hand in the air dismissively. My promotion clearly meant nothing to him. “A Harriman-trained officer is always welcome on the other starships and you come with the Captain’s recommendation. You’ve really reached the limits of what you can do on this ship, my dear John. Unless the Promotion Board sees fit to reverse the decision, you’re going to become a Lieutenant within a week.”
The thought didn’t give me as much pleasure as I would have liked. It wasn’t UNPF policy that crewmen should serve on the same starship for their entire lives, certainly not junior officers like me. The Jacques Delors had become home for me, and the other Ensigns, but if we were promoted, we’d be reassigned to other starships. I had thought that that was to give us a chance to experience life on other ships and carry out a wide variety of duties, but the Senior Chief had explained that the real purpose was to stop us developing enduring friendships. I didn’t understand why, but in any case… there could only be one Captain on the Jacques Delors.
“Thank you, sir,” I said, seriously. I felt conflicted, but proud, even though I suspected that I had few grounds for that pride. “I’ll try and make the Captain proud of me.”
The Jacques Delors had returned to the Solar System three days ago, but instead of travelling through a wormhole directly to Earth, the Captain had decided to take us on a brief sweep through the outer planets before we returned home. The popular conception of the outermost reaches of the solar system had it ringed with clouds of dust and comets, but while there were hundreds of comets, there was nothing that posed a serious threat to the starship. There were videos that suggested that any starship racing through the asteroid belt would certainly crash into an asteroid — with huge loss of life if the asteroid was a populated one — but that wouldn’t happen unless someone intended it to happen. Even so, it would be tricky…
It was another day before I was called into the Captain’s office and I was surprised to discover that Roger and Muna were already there. They looked at me, puzzled, and I realised that they were as surprised to see me as I was to see them. The Captain’s office was tiny, compared to some of the classrooms at the Academy, but it was massive compared to our wardroom. It was neat and tidy, but there were a handful of pictures on the bulkheads. The image of the current Secretary-General was pretty much obligatory, but the other images were different. A dark-haired girl, smiling into the camera, and a pair of children. The thought of the Captain having a family surprised me, even though I knew now that he was in his late forties, and I felt an odd flash of guilt for prying into his private life in such a manner.