Halo_ The Fall of Reach - Eric Nylund [64]
Was all the blame his? As Commander, it was his responsibility to maintain control, to prevent a crewman from even thinking that mutiny was a possibility.
He sighed. Maybe he should have told his crew what he was attempting . . . but there had simply been no time. And certainly, no time for discussion as Jaggers would have wanted. No. The other bridge officers had concerns, but they had followed his orders, as their duty required.
As much as Commander Keyes believed in giving people a second chance, this was where he drew the line.
To make matters worse, transferring Jaggers would leave a hole in the bridge crew.
Commander Keyes accessed the service records ofIroquois ’ junior officers. There were several who might qualify for navigation officer. He flipped through their files on his data pad, and then paused.
The theoretical paper on mass-space compression was still open, as well as his hastily calculated course corrections.
He smiled and archived those notes. He might one day give a lecture on this battle at the Academy. It would be useful to have the original source material.
There was also the data from theArchimedes Sensor Outpost. That report had been thoroughly made: clean data graphs and a navigational course plotted for the object through Slipstream space—not an easy task even with an AI. The report even had tags to route it to the astrophysics section of the UNSC. Thoughtful.
He looked up the service record of the officer who had filed the report: Ensign William Lovell.
Keyes leaned closer. The boy’s Career Service Vitae was almost twice as long as his own. He had volunteered and been accepted at Luna Academy. He transferred in his second year, having already received a commission to Ensign for heroism in a training flight that had saved the entire crew. He took duty on the first outbound corvette headed into battle. Three Bronze Stars, a Silver Cluster, and two Purple Hearts, and he had catapulted to a full Lieutenant within three years.
Then something went terribly wrong. Lovell’s decline in the UNSC had been as rapid as his ascent. Four reports of insubordination and he was busted to Second Lieutenant and transferred twice. An incident with a civilian woman—no details in the files, although Commander Keyes wondered if the girl listed in the report, Anna Gerov, was Vice Admiral Gerov’s daughter.
He had been reassigned to theArchimedes Sensor Outpost, and had been there for the last year, an
unheard of length of time in such a remote facility. Commander Keyes reviewed the logs when Lovell had been on duty. They were careful and intelligent. So the boy was still sharp . . . was he hiding?
There was a gentle knock on his door. “Lieutenant Dominique, I said I was not to be disturbed.” “Sorry to intrude, son,” said a muffled voice. The pressure door’s wheel turned and Admiral Stanforth
stepped inside. “But I thought I’d just stop by since I was in the neighborhood.” Admiral Stanforth was much smaller in person than he appeared on-screen. His back was stooped over
with age, and his white hair was thinning at the crown. Still, he exuded a reassuring air of authority that Keyes instantly recognized. “Sir!” Commander Keyes stood at attention, knocking over his chair. “At ease, son.” The Admiral looked around his quarters, and his gaze lingered a moment on the framed
copy of Lagrange’s original manuscript in which he derived his equations of motion. “You can pour me a few fingers of the whiskey, if you can spare it.” “Yes, sir.” Keyes fumbled with another plastic cup and poured the Admiral a drink. Stanforth took a sip, then sighed appreciatively. “Very nice.”
Keyes righted his chair and offered it to the Admiral. He sat down and leaned forward. “I wanted to congratulate you personally on the miracle you performed here, Keyes.”
“Sir, I don’t—” Stanforth held up a finger. “Don’t interrupt me, son. That was a helluva piece of astrogation you pulled off. People noticed. Not to mention the morale boost it’s given to the entire fleet.” He took another sip of
the liquor and