The Choice

TERRAN REPUBLIC FLEET ESCORT - ADVENTURER: T-MINUS 32 HOURS
  Sitting on his bunk in Warrant officer billet on the Adventurer, Warrant Officer Ty Weiss knew there was no appeal from this as he read over the letter again. From the official Space Force logo at the top of the notice to the signatures at the bottom, this represented the final answer from the adjudication board in regards his promotion. If he recanted his religious beliefs, he’d be converted to a line officer with the rank of Lieutenant. If he didn’t, he would be separated from the service with an administrative discharge. After all the months of writing letter after letter, appeals and waiting, he now had till the end of his duty shift to think about the offered choice. At that time he had to give his answer to the Captain. According to the letter, the consequence, either way, would be immediate.
  The choice left a bitter taste. The offered promotion represented a life goal he’d worked toward since he was a teenager. As he contemplated the decision before him, memories of countless all-night study sessions he’d pulled learning the basics of his craft, flashed through his mind. He thought of the weekends he spent doing extra simulator work as others played and relaxed or of the extra time spent away from his family. The arguments he’d had with himself and his wife during that time came flooding back as he’d vainly tried to assuage the guilt he felt being away from them. It was only his certainty that this sacrifice of time was what he’d felt was the right direction for his family and him to take. He was now faced with the decision of whether or not to recant. If he didn’t he’d throw it all away.
  Opposing this decision were the memories he had of growing up under the tutelage of a devout family that had taken him in when his own family had been killed by an Alliance attack. He remembered their kindness and sacrifices to feed him from the meager amounts of food they themselves had managed to eke out from gardens grown in barren soil. He remembered the nights hiding in caves on the edge of town while their home had been searched by   Alliance troops. And how his adopted parents had risked all to get him away to the safety of the Republic. Over the years, he’d lost track of them due to the ill fortunes of the war.
  Now, after finally getting into the fleet, to attain his goal wherein he hoped to help stop the Alliance, he had to renounce the religion they had taught him love through a lifetime of their sacrifices. All of that swirled around his answer to this letter.
  He put the letter on the table in front of him and stood. The wardroom was silent and empty, everyone else was either sleeping or at their duty stations. Everything stood in sharper relief than he was accustomed to seeing. He saw the scuff marks on the counter tops and table legs, grime on the data terminal keyboards, and even the traffic patterns in the carpet. He could hear the muffled rumble of the main generators coming from the engineering space beneath him and the soft hiss of air being circulated through the room. There was a slight ozone tanginess mingled with the ever present scent of machine oil and soap in the air. The room was standard military gray with dark gray carpet and matching gray walls with a lighter gray overhead. The walls and overheads were the plastic-metallic material fleets had been using for decades in the living spaces of their ships. Designed more for fire resistance and ease of maintenance than aesthetics, it had all the design appeal of a slab of steel.
  He sat motionless for a good while, thinking. Finally, he picked up the paper and moved over to one of the two comm-booths in the room. He sat in the chair, then unzipped and reached into his left breast pocket. He pulled out his comm-card and dropped it into the slot on the left edge of the screen. He pushed the privacy button centered beneath the screen. The sounds in the room around him faded to silence.
  “Place a call. Please,” said Ty.
  The booth’s pseudo feminine voice answered, “Please state name and location of receiving party.”
  He answered, “Amanda Wiess, Murphy’s World, South Continent, Dover City, Three-four-four South DeGrew Street.”
  “Please wait, placing call,” said the booth. After several seconds the booth spoke again, “Call ready to complete. Receiving party requests audio only. Call time begins now.”
  Amanda’s voice answered in the booth. She was whispering.
  “Ty? Is that you?”
  “Yes.”
  “What’s wrong? Is everything OK?”
  Ty felt a rush of conflicting emotions run through him at her question. “I’m fine, but I need to talk.”
  “What’s happened?”
  “I’ve gotten the final decision from the promotion board.”
  “Isn’t that a good thing? Why are you calling me for that? It’s two in the morning right now.”
  “I get the promotion only if I recant my religious beliefs.”
  “What? How can the fleet do that?”
  Ty noticed the sleepiness vanish from her question.
  “It’s the Responsible Service Act. Anyone with devout religious convictions is disqualified from a position of governmental responsibility. Separation of church and state and all.”
  “That’s such a ridiculous law! What are you going to do? Can you appeal the decision?”
  “This is the final word, there is no more appeal. It’s hard Amanda, I want to recant. I want to stay in the service. It’s what I’ve prepared all my life to do. But…” the words choked in his throat.
  “Yes, I know how hard you’ve worked. I can’t, I won't answer for you. But…” she paused. She continued, her voice choked as well, “I know the man I married. I know you’ll chose right and I’ll support you in that choice.”
  There was a moment of silence as he paused to wipe the tears from his face. He felt embarrassed that he would do such a thing.
  “I have until the end of my duty shift to make the decision. I’m going to let the captain know then.”
  “Do you know what you’re going to do?”
  “I’m thinking about it. I’ll call you later when I get off duty.”
  “Just remember these calls are expensive. You can send a text too if you want. I’ll understand.”
  He smiled at that.
  She continued before he could answer, “By the way, they are rationing power here. I’ve about used up all my card’s power today. We get more power in the morning. Don’t try calling or texting before then.”
  “What happened?”
  “You haven’t heard? There was a battle last night at the orbital power station. There was an Alliance attack. There were flashes in the sky visible from the ground. The news is saying we won, but at the same time, the government is saying the station was damaged and power needs to be rationed until it’s repaired. They didn’t say when that would be.”
  “Kids OK?”
  “We’re fine. My card’s almost dead. Talk later ok?”
  “Ok, love you.”
  “Me too,” she said.
  With that the line clicked off. Sounds from the room reappeared as the privacy effect went away.
  He heard footsteps and voices of some people coming down the corridor to the wardroom. Ty glanced at the clock. By the time he guessed it was the Dragon detachment coming in for a few minutes break from getting ready for the next jump. He heard Vince’s voice in the group. From the sounds of it, they were telling another joke. They always told jokes he thought. Ty gathered up the letter and was putting it in the breast pocket of his duty suit as they burst into the room, laughing.
  They all headed for the beverage dispensers. Only Vince noticed Ty.
  “Hey Ty,” he said as he smiled and waved. “Congratulations on your…”
  His voice faded to silence as he saw Ty’s expression.
  Vince spoke to the others, “Be right with you all back at the bay.”
  Some nodded. Others appeared to ignore him as they concentrated on getting something to drink. Singly and in pairs they left the room. Vince walked over to Ty.
  “You OK, Ty? You look like your mom just died.”
  Ty shook his head, “I just got the final notice from the adjudication board.”
  “I thought that was a lock for you, what with General Allison endorsing you and all.”
  Ty shrugged, “Kind of, I get the promotion if I recant.”
“What?” Vince said disbelievingly. Anger along with disgust played across his face as he looked intently into Ty’s eyes. “You’re not going to recant, are you.”
  Ty looked down and then into Vince’s eyes, “Am I that easy to read?”
  A smile flicked across his face, “I know you that well.”
  Ty grimaced, “I wish I knew myself that well. I really want this promotion. I just never thought it would come at this price.”
  Vince nodded, “It’s a controversial law for certain.”
  Ty nodded, “I used to think it was a good thing when it was used to drum all the ‘Firsters’ out of the service. Never conceived of it being used against me.”
  Vince nodded again. “Yeah,” he said. “Justice is blind, but it’s also influenced by the winds of political change these days.”
  Ty looked hard into Vince’s eyes at that.
  Vince continued as he glanced at a clock on the wall over the dispensers. “Well, gotta get back to my section. Choose well.”
  And with that he patted Ty softly on his shoulder and left the room. Ty could hear him jogging the length of the corridor. Ty stood like a statue for several minutes, thinking. Finally, he zipped all the open pockets on his duty suit and did his habitual check of his uniform to make certain it was ship shape. He walked out the wardroom and into the same corridor. Vince’s duty station was aft in the ship’s hangar bay. Ty’s station was up, in the command blister on the top hemisphere of the ship. Rather than climb two decks’ worth of ladders, he chose to gate into the command center. He stepped to the gate which looked like a chrome arch eight feet high and four feet wide built into the passageway. A single red light the size of his palm glowed in the center of the arch. The area of wall enclosed by the arch while it was inactive was just more of the metallic material that made up the rest of the wall.
  Ty spoke at the gate. “Gate, Command Center,” he said.
  The red light blinked and turned green. As it did, the passageway illumination darkened and the semi-dark command center appeared in the arch. Ty stepped through it and into the semi-dark world of the command center. Like all of the other command centers on all of the ships in the fleet, it was a hexagonal shaped room. In clockwise order starting from the main screen was the defense station, then the ship systems. Opposite the main screen was the mission planning work area, which was where the ship’s Captain, Commander Roper was hunched over a plotting table that dominated the area. Next, came the gate and the power management section and last of all was the offense station.
  Ty stepped up to the plotting table beside Roper.
  “Ah, Ty, we just got additional intel reports from the fleet.” He held up a small tablet in his hand for emphasis. “There are indications the Alliance will attempt to attack the convoy once we jump into the Sol system.”
  Ty nodded in response, “How can I help?”
  “We are just a couple of hours from the jump. I want you to review the intel. Then give me your assessment of the information and work up an action plan to deal with a probable attack.” Ty nodded. “Oh, and…” his voice dropped to barely above a whisper, “…I will need your answer at the end of your duty watch, which occurs right after we jump.” He gave Ty a pensive smile and then continued. “I’m going to get a bit of a rest. I’ve been up since yesterday morning. I want Drucker to receive the briefing too.”
  Ty nodded with a smile, “Ok, skipper, I’ll have my scoop ready for you when you return. I’ll get him up here too.”
The man nodded and patted Ty on the back as he walked towards the gate. Ty glanced into the arch when the gate opened and saw that Roper was headed to his quarters. Roper walked through the gate, it turned back into a wall as soon as he did.
  Ty glanced at the main screen. On it, were symbols of all forty of the ships in the convoy, including the Adventurer, his ship. They were in jump formation, one ship after the other all following the same trajectory with about a four-second spacing between ships. They formed a long arc nearly 300,000 miles long. At the speed they were traveling, it would take them almost three minutes to get the whole convoy jumped. As the ship providing protection for the convoy, the Adventurer would go first.
  They were departing the 85 Pegasi star system and making a 40 light year jump to Sol, man’s original home system. From there they were going to jump to Beta Hydri. Ty turned to the table, it was set to 3D mode. He could see their plotted course started near the top of the display and ended near the bottom of the display. Their jump through the Sol System was in the lower half of the display. He looked at the point of light that represented the system and pondered for a moment on the prospect of actually being that close to Earth. He wondered if they’d even be able to see it now. He called up a screen to display the intel reports. As he did, several of the stars represented in the chart table began to blink indicating there was an intelligence assessment linked to the system.
  The Epsilon Indi star system was blinking. Their jump to the Sol system would take them pretty close by the star system. The report appeared on the screen. It spoke of ferrets in the system picking up Alliance comm traffic within the past hour. He immersed himself in the mission planning.
  Time passed. Before he realized how much, an alarm reminded him to get Lieutenant Drucker. Ty called and woke him using the intercom. He arrived through the gate just as Commander Roper arrived. The two were opposites. Roper was a bear of a man standing six and a half feet tall and weighing more than 250 pounds. Drucker on the other hand was a foot taller and more than a hundred pounds lighter. Both were career officers in the fleet. Roper had jet black hair with flecks of silver at his temples. He kept the thick hair cut in a butch. He had heavy dark eyebrows and brown eyes so dark they looked black.
  Drucker was wiry thin and although twenty years younger, completely bald. What hair he did have, he cut so short it was invisible.
  “What do yo have for me Ty?”
  Ty stood erect at the table and faced the Captain before answering.
  “Standard stuff really, there’s some traffic about comm signals being detected in the Epsilon Indi star system.   They weren’t specific about what was detected, so I’ve planned a couple of contingency departures if we need them. But the problem with this system is all of our possible escape jumps require free turning in the second jump to get back to our planned track.”
  “That could be a problem, but we can’t avoid it. This convoy has to get through. Do you think they might try to jump us as we transit?”
  Ty shook his head no as he answered, “It’s always possible, but I doubt it. Aside from the fuel carrier we have with us, we’re not that high a value convoy. I’m recommending we use the gravity well of Jupiter to alter our trajectory for the Beta Hydri jump. It’s the most massive planet in the system. It’ll give our drives the best performance. It’s also in the best position for the turn. The other planets we could use, Uranus or Neptune are further out and so out of position.”
  “Bigger cross-range,” Roper said, more than asked.
  Ty nodded, “From where we’re entering the system? Yes, it adds up to a faster, more stealthy transit of the system by turning on Jupiter.”
  “How much time by turning on Jupiter?”
  “Twenty hours cross-range coasting. Eight hours to execute a level-two deceleration to turning speed. Two hours to make the turn around the planet. Four hour coast to finesse our aim at Beta Hydri. Then ten hours to accelerate to jump speed by pushing away from Jupiter. Total time in system, Forty-four hours. Total window of vulnerability is about six hours centered on our turn. Since our trajectory is nearly perpendicular to the system’s ecliptic, they’ll have to be in orbit around Jupiter to be a real threat to us.”
  “What about the other planets, Uranus and Neptune?”
  “It’s seventy hours on Uranus and ninety hours on Neptune. Windows of vulnerability are correspondingly greater.   But in no case will the Alliance catch us so long as they don’t detect us until we begin decelerating for the turn.”
  “Probability of them detecting us before braking?”
  Ty sighed before answering, “We’re just 45 minutes from Sol, the Alliance’s outer transition limit is at Venus. Once the ships in the convoy start their motors, they’ll be easy to see. Before that, the Alliance will have to know where to look to find us.”
  “What if we get ahead of the convoy, break hard and go into orbit around Jupiter to stand picket?” said Drucker.
  Ty answered, “I thought of that. It’s pretty much sixes in my book. We have several ways to go, sir. We do what Drucker suggests or we jump in and stand picket duty sunward of Jupiter here.” He pointed at a place between the planet and the star. “Or we stick with the convoy and brake with them. Any kind of movement on our part will give us away this close to any ship that’s in system.”
  Roper turned to Drucker, “What do you think Lieutenant?”
  Drucker pursed his lips in concentration before answering, “I’m inclined to stay with the convoy unless we need to engage. Then if we must, we execute a blink attack by jumping on them from wherever we are.”
  “Textbook answer,” said the Captain as he nodded in approval. He turned to Ty. “What about you?”
  “The one thing that’s working really well against the Alliance is the static defense we’re using at systems like Beta Hydri. We don’t jump, we just have roaming pickets that dash towards the enemy ships and fire at maximum range. Once they fire, they withdraw and assess, then repeat as needed. I’d probably go with that approach here. We’re well outside of the Alliance’s transition limit. And Jupiter, as large as it is, isn’t big enough to transition around, so we can attack pretty much from the place of our choosing.”
  Roper nodded at that. Drucker glared.
  “Any other reason why you want to turn on Jupiter then?” the Captain asked with the barest hint of a smile.
  Ty gazed into his eyes a second, “Shorter transit mostly Skipper. I’m concerned about those intel reports on Alliance traffic in the Epsilon Indi system. But it’s also closer to Earth.”
  “Earth?”
  “Yes, Sir, I’ve always wanted to see it, even from a distance.”
  “What do you think happened, Mister Wiess?”
  Ty glanced into his eyes, “Sir?”
  “Earth, why is it uninhabitable now?” asked the Captain.
  Ty blinked and paused a moment before answering. The pause was so long, the captain repeated his question. “Why is Earth uninhabitable? What made it that way? What did they do?”
  “I don’t really know, sir. You’ve studied history as much as I, so I won’t recite the events of that final war, but I would point out that just because an environment is ‘hostile’ to one life form doesn’t mean it’s hostile to all life forms.”
  The Captain looked Ty in the eye. “Do you think people can still live on earth?”
  Ty shook his head. “Obviously we can't, our ships with shields at full strength can’t get much closer to Earth than Luna, its moon.”
  “Interesting that you as a practicing Christian would think that. I thought one of your tenets is that Earth is still populated.”
  Ty paused again before answering. “I am a devout Christian, sir. I just think the Earth wasn’t destroyed, it was changed. Making it uninhabitable for us true, but not for those who live on it now.”
  Drucker rolled his eyes at Ty’s comments, but he kept silent.
  “Isn’t that a matter of semantics? Regardless of the process, if the effect is the same, the same label can be applied. No?”
  “Sir, take a forest, if you cut it down to make room for a city and use the wood to help make the homes. In a sense the forest has been destroyed, but there is still value to the underlying land. It still supports life. The animals can be relocated and the wood serves a purpose in the building of the homes. But it’s not destroyed and wasted in the sense of dropping a nuclear bomb on it.”
  “Ok, but you said, ‘them’. Who do you mean?”
  Ty had a pained look on his face. He wondered where the Captain was going with these questions. “Sir, it’s a historical fact, Earth did enjoy nearly a thousand years of peace under the rule of a benign theocracy.”
  “I don’t question that,” said the Captain.
  Ty continued, “While the idea has fallen out of vogue in recent decades, I believe the world government during that period really was divine in nature and not a secular dynasty that relied on technological sleight of hand to give the appearance of divinity. Towards the end, there were groups that rebelled against the government. They are the ones who eventually started the war. Our ancestors are the ones who saw the war coming and fled to the stars because they didn't want to take sides. It's really that simple to me."
  Roper asked, "What happened to the Earth then? Who do you think won the war?"
  "God won of course. But what happened? My research into the writings of that time say they expected the Earth to be changed some way. The writings are imprecise, no one seemed to really know. So I'm hoping that's what happened.”
  The Captain eyed him steadily for a moment before answering. “I suppose we should get to work eh?”
  “Ok, sir.”
  “You know, Ty. I will miss these talks.”
  “Miss them? I haven’t offered my answer yet,” Ty said as he looked questioningly at the other man.
  “Look Ty, if you recant, you will be promoted and sent to some other billet on a different ship. Your skills as a tactician are wasted here on these convoy duties. The fleet knows that, you’ll likely be reassigned as Senior Tactician on a C-class ship of some type on a shortlist to command as soon as we make port. General Allison hinted that such a billet may open on the cruiser ‘Callisto’ even. If you don’t recant, you’ll also be gone. Either way, you’re gone. I wanted to know how you really felt about these things while I had the opportunity to ask.”
  He smiled at Ty. Ty nodded in understanding.
  “On a less weighty subject, how is Junior?” asked the commander after a moment of silence.
  Ty smiled at the question. “Doing really well actually.”
  “How so?”
  “I flew an engagement against the simulator using our auxiliary command console in engineering, slaved to Junior. Drucker and I dueled it out for a good ten-seconds or so before I got him.”
  “He lasted a whole ten-seconds?” said Roper in mock surprise as he looked at Ty then at Drucker.
  Ty answered, “Well, actually, he did pretty well. We started the battles after all the pre-engagement maneuvering is done in neutral advantage relationships, so all there was, was the shootout and terminal evasive maneuvering. My average opponent in the shootout competition last year lasted about four-seconds. So, comparatively, he did pretty well.”
  “I happen to know, it was three point seven-seconds. Plus, that’s where you’re best.”
  “It’s Drucker’s strength too.”
  “It’s beside the point, Ty, what you’re saying is Junior can fight. Which I think is an amazing accomplishment.”
  “Yes, sir, so long as the rest of the ship’s systems are set to autonomous mode, Junior’s got enough smarts to autonomously run the targeting systems, shoot the weapons and tell the flight controller where to steer the ship. All he needs is an operator to guide him.”
  “So, we have a tertiary backup for our flight control system?” asked the Commander with a smile.
  Ty shook his head. “Not really sir, I only started this as a project to allow an entire combat team to work together on an engagement using laptops and our sole simulator. Getting enough of the flight controller into the memory of a laptop to actually fly multi-unit engagements was serendipitous.”
  “It’s impressive just the same,” said the commander.
  “Chief Anderson helped a lot. It wouldn’t have happened without her knowledge of the flight software,” said Ty.
  They resumed their conversation about what contingency plans Ty thought they should take on the pending jump. When they finished, it was nearly time to jump. While Ty remained at the plotting table, he donned his headset so he could speak to the Captain while he was merged. The captain took the command chair in the center of the room. He reclined it to get ready to merge. Sitting beside him, facing him, Davies, the junction monitor waited for him. The captain turned to face him.
  “Full sensors and maneuvering control only this time,” he said.
  Davies nodded. The captain laid his head back on the headrest and closed his eyes.
  As the merge began, he appeared to be sleeping. Davies focused on the readouts displaying on the monitors in front of him. His hands typed several commands into the system. Ty watched this.
  As the merge took hold, he heard the captain’s voice over his headset, “Ok, I’m merged. I’ve set the jump parameters now.”
  “Tactical copies,” said Ty.
  The other departments reported in. The jump parameters were broadcast to the other ships in the convoy. Ty made some adjustments to the charting table so it zoomed in on just the convoy. The ships appeared as a string of pulsing white pinpoints of light running along a thin translucent white line. A red circle appeared at the end of the line they were traveling along. The green dot representing the Adventurer was nearly on top of the red circle.
  “Jump in fifteen,” said the captain over the circuit. “Ten,” he said. He counted down from five, “Five, Four, Three, Two, One, Jumping.”
  Ty felt nothing when they jumped. He never did. In the chart table, the ships disappeared. Then four-seconds after they arrived, a point of light appeared behind them. Ty noted that the following ship’s trajectory was off from the Adventurer’s. He pursed his lips as he watched them arrive. The ships were scattered by the variances in the accuracy of their jumping systems. There would need to be some maneuvering to get them all on a workable trajectory. He knew the captain was looking deep into the solar system they’d just arrived in for signs of Alliance ships or snooping platforms.
  A minute after the last freighter jumped in, an alert sounded in the command center. The captain’s voice came from the intercom speakers. His figure remained still in the couch.
  “Our high-link transmissions are being jammed. The source is deep in system, near Venus. Assessment gentlemen?”
  Ty turned to Drucker as the senior officer at tactical.
They traded glances before Drucker answered, “Sir, it’s a sure thing, they know we’re coming.” Ty nodded in agreement as the man spoke. “It likely means we won’t gain anything by running silent.”
  Ty nodded again.
  “Very well,” Roper answered. He paused a moment. “Ty, as your watch is over now. I need to make a decision on what to do. One answer means you will be an observer of the engagement and watch it from the wardroom. The other answer means you’ll man tactical through the engagement. I’m certain the Lieutenant would like you at tactical.”
  Drucker nodded.
  “What is it to be?”
  As much as Ty wanted things to be different, to be somewhere else, the moment was upon him. He glanced at Drucker who waited passively. His face void of emotion. Ty glanced at Roper’s figure laying supine in the couch. While the figure was inert. Ty knew the captain was fully alert and waiting for his choice. Ty’s mind flashed back across the million and one arguments he’d made for and against this situation. While they’d all been academic to this point, it mattered now and the choice was terrifying. With the sinking feeling of stepping into space off of a ledge knowing there was no parachute or landing system to save him, but determined not to offend the God he knew existed and was watching him with equal interest, he let the words come out.
  “I can’t recant sir.”
  His words hung for a moment. The other officers in the command center turned to look at him from their stations. Some looked with shock, some with pity, others with silent approbation for his choice. The moment passed.
  Commander Roper spoke, “I’m sad Ty. I will try to understand. In accordance with your choice, you are hereby relieved of duty. Lieutenant Drucker, please escort Mr. Weiss from the command center to his quarters and arrange to have security monitor his presence in the wardroom. Then return here so we can plan the traversing of this system. Ty, I really will miss these conversations. I enjoyed serving with you. I regret this is what happened.”
  “Me too, sir, and likewise, I’ve enjoyed serving with you.”
  “Come on, Ty,” said Drucker.
  As he left the command center, as if directed by some unseen conductor, the command crew stood in unison and saluted Ty. He paused at the portal and returned the salute.
  Ty felt differently than he thought he would. On one level he felt at peace with his choice. On another level, he wondered what his new future would bring and how he’d ever do what he felt destined to do. On still another level, he wondered if he’d made the right choice. He also had a gnawing fear of how he’d support his family.

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