Shipmind Chapter 35 – Epilogue

We hadn’t made it to the fleet base but in the end, the fleet base had come to us. The news we’d carried was so dire that Pagar’s Claim now played host to half the Navy command structure for this entire side of the Commonwealth. I’d head talk from a few friends among the shipminds here that they might permanently relocate the base here.

But they were also here for me. I’d been disconnected from what remained of my hull, and it was just me here in my life support unit again, as it had been that first day Pepper and Woozy woke me up as a new person.

That had just been weeks ago. It felt like a lifetime. In a sense, I supposed it really was.

The hearing to decide my fate that I’d so worried about ended up being almost comically brief. They’d decided almost immediately that Marcus, Tann, and I weren’t going to be executed. That provision of the Commonwealth charter hadn’t been used in so long that it was unanimously agreed by the Navy commanders present—to be confirmed by the full Commonwealth Council when news got back to the capital at Iomi Prime—that it shouldn’t be enforced.

The death penalty was a product of a harsher time, in the shadow of the war that had shattered so much of hyperspace, when one more hyperbomb could have ended the nascent Commonwealth then and there. It wasn’t who we were now, and we didn’t simply put someone to death, no matter what their crime.

Still. I had committed the one crime the Commonweath itself was founded to prevent.

Blackness Pierced Only By Starlight, the Iomi Admiral in charge of the fleet here, resumed speaking.

“It is, of course, beyond question that you be expelled from the Navy. I trust the reasons why are clear.”

I tried to keep my voice level, but it was hard. The Navy had been my life. Both my lives if you counted the Imperial Navy too, which I’d already left behind. “Violation of founding principles, plus technically being an Empire turncoat. I wouldn’t want me either. I suppose I’d almost let Woozy talk me into retiring anyway. Can I still do that?”

“Normally we would encourage such,” Blackness confirmed. “However, the nature of this Operation Firewall presents us with a quandary. We agree that the Empire cannot be permitted to cut a dead zone across the galaxy simply to keep away the monsters they imagine us to be.”

“I’ve offered everything I know freely. I think even Marcus—Commander Marks was willing to cooperate, not that I’ve seen them since we got off the King’s Ransom. I’m not sure what more we can give you.”

The Iomi didn’t move, but a sound came from the panel in their desk. It was my voice.

“I’ve met Emperor Amelia and they’re surprisingly humble.” The recording of my brief history of the Empire from a few days ago.

“We find ourselves presented with an opportunity,” Blackness intoned. “Tell us, have you ever been part of an ambassadorial mission?”