The Commander (33 page)

“The day after, I believe.” Luke advised.

The chancellor looked pained, but nodded and hurried away.

“Thank God for that,” Tyler whispered feebly. “Don’t know if I could keep on for today.”

# # #

Four days later, the conference reconvened. A local holiday of importance had delayed an earlier resumption. The break helped Tyler’s recovery. He looked almost human and was ready to reengage with the ministers.

The weather turned cold and the pavilion was not centrally heated. The Jiguan custom was that nature, better than voluminous orders of protocol, would ensure governmental proceedings did not drag on unduly.

To ward off the inclement weather, George replicated a floor-length robe that was comfortably warm but the oversized hood gave Luke and Tyler a faintly monkish appearance. The ministers, on the other hand, were draped in luxurious robes adorned with elaborate sashes or badges of office.

On the chancellor’s side of the pavilion, several curved tables butted end-to-end, were filled with planetary officials. Behind them, the inevitable assortment of aides clustered together and scurried back and forth.

On Luke’s side, the single table was empty save for Tyler and Luke himself. Behind them, a few local attendants, placed there out of courtesy by the chancellor, hovered nervously. Periodically an attendant would replace Luke’s untouched goblet with a fresh one.

The chancellor opened the day’s proceedings. “Ambassador Robertson, we are pleased to see you looking so much better.”

Tyler nodded and mumbled a thank-you.

“If I may,” the chancellor continued. “Let me sum up the question at hand. The honorable members of this conference, delegates from around our world, continue to struggle with the question of our membership in an enterprise that is so permeated with violence.”

There was a general rumbling of assent around the pavilion before the chancellor continued.

“I have struggled to inform our delegates who were
not
present during the period in question,” he paused to cast significant glares at some of his associates, “of the malicious intent of the ruffian known as General Hwangje. I have not been successful in that effort. I am afraid that Commander Blackburn’s actions are being interpreted in the worst possible light.”

One of the delegates could not restrain himself. “Commander Blackburn? Don’t you mean Warlord Blackburn? His own people call him that. Do you deny it?”

Luke sighed and closed his eyes.

“Sorry about that,” Tyler said quietly to Luke. “You know how these things get started. It was all in fun at the beginning.”

“I know,” Luke replied.

“You see?” the delegate shouted. “It’s true. He does not deny it. How can we engage with such a person?”

Luke held up a hand and the room quieted. “I don’t deny it. Although the title is one given to me by my crew in jest.”

“In jest?” another delegate shrieked. “You joke about such things? How is this possible?”

“Ministers!” Bo’erm thundered. “Please do not speak unless you are recognized. The point has been made.”

“The point has
not
been made,” a delegate two seats down from Bo’erm shouted, rising to his feet. The side of his face was heavily bandaged to the point he could only see out of one eye. It was the man Luke had nicked with stray buckshot. Luke had seen the wound; it was barely a scratch.

“I saw the warlord crash into this very chamber,” the aggrieved delegate proclaimed. “I saw that enormous instrument of violence spit fire and death that ripped away the general’s very life in the most horrible fashion. And not just the general. He turned the weapon on an attendant who died right before my eyes. I was almost killed myself!” The delegate gently touched his cheek and groaned with pain.

The delegates burst into expressions of sympathy for their wounded colleague and dismay at the horrible situation in which they found themselves.

One of the delegates pointed at Luke, shouting, “This is why we demand that you appear now with an explanation.”

Luke felt a jolt of déjà vu. In his mind’s eye, he saw Congressman Morán from long ago, standing in the hotel conference room in Baggs, demanding that Luke appear in front of a congressional committee.

It was an epiphany. Luke leaned over to Tyler and whispered. “These guys are just congressmen. Why didn’t I realize that before?” Luke had never heard of a congressman that wasn’t on the take one way or another. To control a politician, you had to control their money.

Luke stood up and the room fell silent. Several of the delegates flinched as though Luke might pull out his shotgun and start blazing away.

“Chancellor Bo’erm,” Luke began. “First, let me say thank you for your hospitality.” He gave a curt bow. “Second, I want to emphasize that the alliance recognizes your sovereignty above all else. Your democracy is to be cherished by one and all. I perceive that your citizenry has grown tired of our presence so we will leave as quickly as possible.”

A general hum of pleasure ran through the assemblage upon hearing this news.

Luke continued. “Please return all of the replicators that we provided and we will depart. You should know that any replicators that are not returned will be given an order to self-destruct upon our departure. You are familiar with our self-destruct process, I believe.” Luke nodded in the general direction of the crater left by
Toby
’s demise.

“And lastly, I wish you the best of luck when the Bakkui, who recently visited your solar system, return.” Luke gestured to the large viewscreen he had previously installed for training purposes.

“As we leave, I invite you to take note of a planet we recently visited. The population was not as lucky as Jigu. George, please display the video from Bradley’s Planet. Let’s go, Tyler.” Luke helped his friend to his feet and led him out of the suddenly silent pavilion.

The video began playing, displaying the horrific images George’s drones had captured during the Bakkui bombardment and those taken afterward by Colonel Lindsey’s reconnaissance teams. In living color, the ministers could watch city after city smashed into rubble. Dead bodies lay everywhere, some blown apart, some crushed by the force of inconceivable destruction. Cries of horror poured out of the delegates inside. Most scurried frantically from the chamber to collapse in the rain outdoors.

Luke stooped next to one of the delegates who had rushed out to vomit on the wet pavement. “Tell the chancellor I’ll be back in five days to say good-bye,” he said.

“What are we doing?” Tyler asked.

“Giving them a reality check. George, come pick me up. Contact all of our ships in system and retrieve our personnel on planet. Everyone is going to spend the next five days on the local moon. And shut off all surface replicators immediately.”

“Acknowledged, Commander. What about the video currently playing?”

“Let it loop until we come back. There are several hours and they need to see it if they’re ever going to understand.”

“Command acknowledged,” George replied.

A sonic boom filled the air and the pavilion rocked once again from the warship’s thunderous arrival. George set down a few feet away and two members of the crew jumped out to assist with Ambassador Robertson.

# # #

Over the next five days, Luke and everyone else worked to establish a new base on Jigu’s only moon. Very prosaically, it was named Moonbase Two. The internal maintenance bay of the
Ambrosia
-class warship contained a twelve-foot-square replicator. George used it to create several of the stonecutters that had worked so well on Isaac Newton Gateway. By the morning of the third day, a modest hangar had been cut into one of the moon’s mountainous craters and force fields installed. Everyone now had comfortable quarters and a food court was established.

While the work progressed, George kept Luke up-to-date regarding events on the planet. There was no sound, but through a camera built into the pavilion’s viewscreen, Luke could see for himself what happened in the former conference chamber.

The room emptied quickly after Luke and Tyler left. Once the delegates realized what the video display depicted, they bolted in horror. The peaceful ministers had no stomach for such a graphic portrayal of a Bakkui strike

All except the chancellor ran from the reality. Bo’erm, on the other hand, sat quietly by himself and watched for several hours. In the late afternoon, he stood and departed. Luke was shocked by the change in the man’s appearance. He had aged visibly. He walked away, stooped over like a man crippled by hardship.

Late the next morning a young woman was the only one who returned. Luke did not recognize her and had not seen her at the conference.

“I think that’s the chancellor’s daughter,” Tyler said. “I met her a couple of times.”

She entered the pavilion tentatively, looking for anyone who might be present.
Seeing
no one, she stood alone in front of the video and watched the scenes of death. Luke marveled that she could stomach what the screeching delegates could not.

Her solitary figure was a pathetic sight. Time and again she crumpled to the floor to vomit until there was nothing left in her stomach. Each time she struggled back to her feet and until well after dark continued to watch the lost planet’s throes of annihilation.

The woman did not re-appear until the following morning. On the third day, at the same time that Luke and his people were enjoying themselves in their new food court, she returned. This time she was not alone.

Accompanying her
were the delegates that had previously fled. They stood huddled outside the pavilion, in a long line as she called each one individually to take their turn before the viewscreen. The woman remained next to them, ensuring they witnessed the horrible ending to another planet’s civilization. Without exception, every single representative quickly succumbed to the imagery.

After a very brief period, only seconds for some, the delegates would rip a decorative pin from their lapels and frantically hand it to the woman before escaping the building. The next minister would then be summoned into her presence. By the end of the day, all of the ministers had capitulated.

At the beginning of the fourth day, she covered the viewscreen with an elegant drapery and commanded workers to clear away the remains of the earlier conference. The tables were removed and the floors scrubbed clean of the vomit that stained the marble tiles. Two new, smaller rectangular tables were installed. A single chair was placed at one, where previously Chancellor Bo’erm and his ministers were seated. The two chairs at the other were obviously intended for Luke and Tyler.

At dawn on the fifth day, she again returned to the pavilion, alone once more. She removed the drapery from the viewscreen and sat quietly in her chair. On the table, she placed a crystal bowl filled with the lapel pins she had taken from the government officials.

Her singular efforts made a deep impression on Luke. To say he was fascinated by her strength of character would be an understatement.

Luke told George he wanted to land exactly five days from the minute they had departed the conference.
Sitting
on the warship’s bridge, waiting for the appointed hour of their return, Luke discussed the young woman’s situation with Tyler.

“I wish she had been there instead of those idiots,” Tyler observed. “We wouldn’t have had this delay. I know you need to get back to Carrie and Bradley.”

“That’s true. But what we want to accomplish here is just as important. These things take time. It’s just a shame that it has to be so painful.”

Tyler agreed. “Just
thinking
about Bradley’s Planet is bad enough. I don’t know how she could stand watching it.”

“It was like a personal obligation,” Luke observed. “The way she forced herself, it was a lot more than education. It looked to me as though she was punishing herself.”

“Why?” Tyler wondered. “Why would anyone do that?”

“I guess we’ll find out. You ready?”

“Not really.”

“No sonic booms, George. We’ve been hard enough on them.”

“Understood, Commander.”

# # #

The plaza outside the pavilion was devoid of life, as though the word had gone out, stay away or suffer the consequences. Luke and Tyler stepped out of the warship and entered the pavilion where the young woman sat stoically.

When the two men took their seats, she gestured toward the display screen. “Can you please stop that?” she asked, almost in a whisper.

Kill the video please, George.

The screen blinked off and the woman seemed to slump in relief, as if she had forced herself to sit tall in defiance while the images were running.

“I’m Lucas Blackburn,” Luke said. “This is Ambassador Robertson.”

“I know who you are, Warlord,” she said in a strong voice, belying her tear-streaked face and red eyes. The days of anguish had left their mark.

“And you are…” Luke prompted. “I was expecting to meet with Chancellor Bo’erm”

“I am she.”

Luke and Tyler exchanged a look of bewilderment.