Chapter Twenty-Nine

Ceremony

Commander Richard Kelby

I'm so wound up right now, if I was a few years younger or not surrounded by quite so many people, I might be bouncing with excitement –or, if I hadn't just gone to the head, doing the potty dance due to anxiety. In just a few minutes, I'm going to get started on the biggest project I've ever been trusted to handle, but first there are a last few legal formalities to be handled.

And a speech.

That I'm expected to give.

Which will be broadcast live throughout the station.

And reported by Marla Moore on the Imperial News Network's evening broadcasts all over the Empire.

So, not much at all then. I can even ignore the thought that the Empress herself might be watching.

Because I'm the one who convinced the commodore that turning the signing of a couple of documents into a little ceremony would be good for morale.

I'm still convinced I'm right about that, but once it became clear that the commodore wouldn't allow me to delegate the speech to anyone else, I kind of wished he would have talked me out of it. But no, he just impressed upon me how important it was that I not screw it up.

"You wouldn't be doin' it if I didn't think you could, Rich. It never bothered you to talk to the press before."

Now that stung. "Chief, I apologized for that," I reminded him. "I might not have understood at the time the trouble I was causing, but I get it now and I really am sorry."

He waved away my objection.

"This has nothin' to do with that. I accepted your apology an' as far as I'm concerned that's all water under the bridge now. This isn't revenge. But like it or not, Jupiter Station is kind of a big deal, an' if you want to take a leadership role around here, every once in a while, you're gonna be in the public eye.

"It doesn't have to move mountains, it just needs to reassure people that things are ticking over as they should up here. Keep it short, keep it simple, keep it upliftin', an' don't speak ill of the dead. Once you've written it, have Janis Crawley give it a once over."

"Major Crawley, sir?" I may be no particular hand at writing speeches, but I'm momentarily bewildered as to why our head of station security should need to look at it first.

"To make sure nothin' in it could compromise Imperial security," he said with a brief smile. "You'd be surprised what might. I once had a joke about a captain maintainin' a Nuvian masseuse on Risa for his exclusive use struck from a speech I was givin' at an awards dinner, only to find out later that one of the captains being honored had been doin' exactly that, with funds not intended for his personal use, an' Imperial Security didn't want him to know they knew about it until they were ready to arrest him."

Well, I won't be cracking wise about any Starfleet captains, that's a risky idea at best, but I did make sure Major Crawley had ample time to review my speech. All she did was make a couple of grammatical corrections.

Sometimes it's strange to me, the things the Empire decides need to be marked with ritual. As it turns out, handing over a potential crime scene for repair and reconstruction isn't a simple matter of the chief investigator sending an e-mail to the guy in charge of rebuilding the place telling him, 'Okay, you can start work tomorrow.' You'd think it would be, but it isn't.

First, there is a legally prescribed period of two weeks after the final report is published during which any interested parties can object to the scene being released or demand a guided tour from the investigating authority to satisfy them that the investigation was thorough and the conclusions sound. I'd never heard of any such law myself, and when I mentioned at one of the morning meetings my surprise that it hadn't been taken off the books by now because it could really complicate things for a busy, vital installation like Jupiter Station, Commodore Tucker went off at me like a photon torpedo.

"Goddamnit, Kelby! Don't you realize that's one of the few laws left that really benefits the little people?" he practically hollered at me. "It's called the 'Right of Review' an' I happen to personally know one very brave, very clever lawyer who has used it in two different cases to help secure survivors' benefits for the families of 'Fleeters who were killed in trainin' drills. Their captains were accusin' them of cowardice an incompetence, but 'anonymous sources' reported it was the captain's failure to follow his engineers' maintenance advice that got one killed an' that the other was set up by his SiC.

"Under the law, an' with permission from the next-of-kin, that lawyer petitioned to personally examine every survivin' member of the crews of those two ships. He never got the chance, because in each case the captain withdrew his charges within a week, the one fella's SiC was involuntarily transferred to a ship on the front lines, an' the survivors' benefits were paid as lump sums into trusts that will help support the widows for the rest of their lives an' provide for the children until they're grown. It's a pity the truth never came out, but at least those babies didn't go hungry."

"Well, that's fine if they did their duty, but what if the captain was right in either or both of those cases? What if someone's family just doesn't want to accept reality? How long could we run this station without a sickbay?"

"You really think the Empire would forget to protect itself from somethin' like that?" he scoffed. "For one thing, the Right of Review can be suspended for a ship that's needed in battle. The admiralty gets to decide which ships are needed, an' the Empress just has to sign off.

"Then, if the admirals aren't willin' to help a captain out by sendin' him into battle, there's a counter-process called a 'Review of Record.' If a proper investigation is completed an' the lead investigator is confident of his results, he can submit a request to have his files reviewed by three senior officers who are required to work through the evidence an' conduct their own investigations until they reach a consensus an' then make a recommendation to the JAG office.

"I was part of one of those review committees, once, an' we read every report that security chief submitted, examined every piece of physical evidence he'd collected, re-interviewed every person he'd talked to, an' talked to a few people he didn't. We tried our damnedest to find fault with the investigation, because we couldn't help but think about how our families would cope without our benefits an' with the ruination of our names an' reputations an' all the consequences that holds for them. But in the end, we found the MACO who'd investigated the case had done his job an' reached a sound conclusion.

"Still, we were allowed to take into account things the MACO investigator couldn't, like what the officer had been asked to do, an' what he'd already been through just prior to the incident in question. Since none of us were too sure that we could have succeeded where he failed, we recommended that his record be changed from desertion to a first offense of dereliction of duty an' that, in light of fifteen years of loyal service prior to the incident, his family should get seventy-five percent of his benefits.

"There was a good judge on that case. She made our recommendation a legal order. Some judges, wantin' to curry favor with the powers that be by savin' the Empire money, or just bein' stingy bastards, I guess, just publish the panel's findin's without changin' the decision on benefits. Even that helps the survivors a little bit, because while they don't get any money from the Fleet, at least they don't have to defend themselves against the accusation of havin' a traitor or a coward in the family an' if their financial situation is bad enough, they're not disqualified from gettin' public aid.

"It's one part of our legal system that works exactly as it was meant to, Kelby, so don't fuckin' knock it!"

I was so flabbergasted by his angry rant that I froze up. I think he could have smashed me in the face with a sledgehammer and I wouldn't even have tried to duck, I was so dumbfounded. I think most of the others in the room were completely taken aback too, it was like lightning out of a clear sky and that's not normally like the Chief; maybe it was the total shock that immobilized everyone. In the end it was Colonel Burnell, of all people, who still attends the morning meeting several days a week even though he defers to Major Crawley on all matters related to station security, who talked the Commodore down.

"Respectfully, Commodore, I don't think Mr. Kelby was objecting to the law," he said, his voice calm and non-committal. "Rather, I suspect he was merely seeking to learn more about something he didn't understand. As a matter of fact, I was not aware of the details of the law as you explained it, either, and if I may say so, sir, I think you have done a most thorough job of schooling us all."

Sometimes, Burnell can be so subtle I really don't know how to take him, and maybe that's one of the reasons he scares me. I've been thinking about it for days, and I still don't know if that bit about the commodore 'schooling us' was meant to be a gentle reprimand to him for losing his temper or a mild compliment about his knowledge of the law. Either way, the commodore had the good grace to look a little ashamed.

He turned red up to the tips of his ears and fell silent for a long moment, his stormy gaze now fixed on Austin rather than me; but Burnell just looked back at him steadily, ice meeting fire. I'd have been willing to bet the boss was literally biting his tongue to stop himself from saying something else he might regret, but for all that he obviously feels deeply about the matter we've been discussing, he's basically a fair guy who knows when he's been called on unfair behavior. When he finally spoke, he was clearly taking pains to control himself.

"You're right, Austin," he enunciated so carefully it was almost mechanical. "I suppose I did overreact." Turning to me, he said, "In the future, Rich, you need to stick up for yourself, son. I think everyone here now knows that I underestimated you once, an' I regretted it. You deserve better from me. If I ever accuse you again of somethin' that just isn't true, I expect you to set me straight. Go ahead an' interrupt me if you have to. My bark is usually worse than my bite, an' I guarantee the other people around this table will back you up if I'm in the wrong. It's happened before an' I'm sure it'll happen again, 'cause I'm a fallible human bein' like the rest of you. But still, I'm sorry for chewin' you out like that."

Then he looked around the table and made eye-contact with everyone there.

"There's no excuse for my poppin' off at Rich the way I did, but as an explanation, I'd like to say that, while I know you all lost people you cared about in the explosion, as the CO of this station, I bear a personal responsibility for every one of those lives. To think that anyone would seek to deny or withhold the benefits due their survivors just… Hell, it makes me mad enough to want to chew nails an' spit tacks!"

"I don't think that's what Rich was suggesting, Boss." Rostov spoke up on my behalf, his tone still a bit tentative.

"I know it wasn't, Mike," the commodore said, calmly enough, "but there are others who have, an' I think the only thing that prevented it was havin' the Empress on our side."

He refused to name names, but that revelation came just the day after his last meeting with the admiralty, so we all figured there was at worst a twenty-five percent chance of guessing who it was.

Once the two week waiting period ends, which it did last night, there are documents that need to be signed and authenticated with retinal scans and voice prints. The voice prints require the involved parties to read aloud prescribed legal statements describing the site that is changing hands, naming the person relinquishing authority over the site and the person accepting it, and affirming that the person accepting it will turn over any potential evidence that is discovered in the course of reconstruction. From what I read, it actually takes about ten minutes to sign and authenticate all the records, record the statements, and transmit them to the Imperial Judicial Archives.

It was my big idea to turn the handover into a ceremony.

Foolishly, I thought once the commodore was sold on the idea, he'd hand it off to someone who routinely plans and organizes ceremonial functions. No, of course not; it's my baby now.

I think the world of Commodore Tucker. Maybe I always have and just didn't know it. Maybe that's part of the reason I was so pissed off when he took Hess and Rostov and more than half the engineering crew of the Enterprise with him to Jupiter Station and dumped me on Utopia Planitia.

But sometimes I really do think I could kill him and not lose as much as a wink of sleep over it. In fact, over the past couple of weeks, I've even fantasized about going cheerfully to my death after eagerly confessing my crime. My motive? Schadenfreude. He was just too damned amused by my suffering.

"I think that's a fine idea, Rich," he'd said with a mischievous grin the moment I suggested it. "We'll get all the command staff turned out in their dress uniforms…" This got me the evil eye from most of my colleagues around the table. Nobody likes the dress uniform. "…maybe a couple of the admirals…" This brought on the eye rolls. Perhaps the only thing that can make a function more uncomfortable than the dress uniform is the presence of the admiralty. "…an' top it off with someone from the government, probably the Minister of Defense!" Mike Rostov actually cracked his knuckles and glared at me, while the commodore, clearly carried away by his own imagination, was as gleeful as a kid throwing snowballs. "Eloise, soon as we're finished here, get a hold of someone at IMRO. I wanna talk to them about gettin' us some news coverage. Rich here is gonna give us a real dog an' pony show!"

The ceremony itself was easy enough to organize. "Talk to Eloise," I'd been told when I admitted that I had no idea where to start. "Damned near everything that happens on this station pops up on her sensors eventually. She'll know who can help you out."

Turns out there's an entire committee with a core of about twenty official members who have volunteered to plan ceremonial and social events for the station throughout the year and almost five hundred additional 'members-at-large' who don't usually show up for the meetings but lend a hand with the grunt work of actually decorating and setting up chairs and so forth. They've done a fine job here today with balloons and bunting and flags, the Imperial Seal on the podium and little program cards with a schedule of events printed on them for the attendees. It seems like a hell of a lot of effort and a surprising amount of expense for a little ceremony that should only last twenty minutes or so, but Crewman Cunningham from the galley and Ensigns Hart and Heynem from ops insisted it had to be done. I couldn't even talk them out of the cocktail hour before the event, which, as the keynote speaker, I had to attend. (At least Cunningham is working the bar and I could arrange beforehand for him to make my gin and tonic light on the gin and heavy on the tonic so I needn't worry about slurring my way through my speech.)

Admiral Gardener happens to be the only one of the Starfleet senior command staff who could make it, and for some reason he and Commodore Tucker both seem keen to avoid one another. So I spend most of the cocktail hour conversing with the admiral and the Minister of Defense, Faiz Bahar, who will give a brief speech of his own and then introduce me. When I'm finished, the commodore and Major Crawley will complete the last step of turning over the facility for reconstruction, and then a pre-recorded message from the Empress will play. The ceremony will end with me asking Commodore Tucker for permission to begin work, and once he gives it, I will command my people to get started.

That last bit, having my team start work as the finale of the ceremony, was my idea, and as a side benefit (entirely unintended) it made me a hero to my crew. The woman from IMRO liked the image of Imperial industriousness it created, but she didn't like the idea of sixty engineers in faded, worn, and stained coveralls parading past the television cameras to swarm over what is going to be the Empire's most advanced medical facility. Hart and Heynem suggested they all be provided with new uniforms, and when the commodore got wind of that, he asked to use the opportunity to debut the new female engineering uniforms he had Anna Hess, Liz Cutler, Julie Massaro, and Jenn Kelly design. According to the IMRO officer, the newly-designed uniforms are just 'too perfect' because they give the media the opportunity for a 'nice little sidebar about creativity and innovation for personal safety'. Though Anna, Julie, and Jenn aren't thrilled with the idea of giving an interview that excludes Liz, they're happy enough to have the opportunity to trumpet their success and praise the commodore's leadership and practical concern for his female engineers and will make a point, I'm sure, of naming Liz as part of the team.

"…Commander Richard Kelby."

It's just dumb luck that I've surfaced from my deep thoughts in time to hear Minister Bahar introduce me. Sometimes, in the Empire, the most dangerous enemy is boredom. Boredom leads to inattention, and I'm sure the minister would have been annoyed, offended, and worst of all, embarrassed if I'd have missed my cue and left him hanging. Embarrassing the Minister of Defense, even if he is just a civilian stuffed shirt with no real power who answers to the Empress and General Reed, would still be enough to get me in some real hot water – and Commodore Tucker, too, because he's the one who put me in charge of this project.

Fortunately, I'm just aware enough and prepared enough to move smoothly to the podium when I'm called up. I thank Minister Bahar for his introduction, Admiral Gardener for gracing us with his august presence, Commodore Tucker for the confidence he has shown in trusting me to head the project, Colonel Burnell and Major Crawley for the swift and thorough investigation of the accident, and the Jupiter Station Social Committee for arranging the ceremony. It takes all of thirty seconds, but it gives me time to settle in and properly honors dignitaries and worker bees alike.

The commodore and Major Crawley both advised me to read my speech from the teleprompter when the time came, warning me that even the briefest lapse can lead to an awkward pause that takes on an unintended meaning in the minds of the audience or, worse yet, an inappropriate improvisation that takes the unwitting speaker into the taboo. I was determined to speak naturally and from memory, but now I'm grateful for their advice. Just hours ago, I knew what I was going to say by heart, but somewhere between the cocktails and the thank-yous, my opening line has evaporated from my memory. Fortunately, with just the briefest glance at the prompter screen, I'm back on track, and the effort of memorizing what I intended to say isn't wasted because I am able to speak with feeling rather than reading the text from the screen like an automaton.

"Three weeks ago yesterday, the Empire lost nearly forty of its best and brightest in a terrible accident that occurred just beyond those doors." I turn halfway and gesture to the doors behind me. "To most citizens of the Empire they were loyal soldiers – heroes, if not in life, then certainly in their deaths, for they all died serving their Empress. To those of us who worked beside them day in and day out, and to the families they left behind, they were far more than soldiers and heroes. They were respected colleagues, trusted friends, and loved ones."

'Heroes' might actually be a stretch for most of the medics and technicians who died in the blast, but ceremonies such as this one demand a little hyperbole, and nobody's going to argue with me publicly praising the dead. As for 'respected colleagues, trusted friends, and loved ones,' well, almost everybody I've ever known in the Fleet has had at least two of the three, at least up until the relationship threatened an opportunity for promotion or brought on the risk of punishment. I guess it's Human nature; despite all the deceit, backstabbing, and selfishness the Empire thrusts upon us, we need each other.

"Last week, it was right and proper for all of us to take a moment to mourn and mark their passing. It was a reminder that even in times of triumph and prosperity, life can be harsh and unexpected tragedy can befall us at any moment.

"But the time for looking back has past.

"One of humanity's best traits, one of the most important characteristics we share as a race, is our resilience. When dealt a setback, we learn from it, build upon it, rise up, and push forward again. From the first time one of us struck a spark from a flint to start a fire, to the wheel and the gear, to man power and then horsepower, the steam engine, internal combustion, fusion, and warp drive, we have always been pushing forward. The poet Robert Browning said, '…man's reach should exceed his grasp,/ Or what's a heaven for?'

"As a race, we have done more than merely exceed our grasp. We have breached the heavens, colonized them, and now we claim the stars."

Privately, I think the Empire is growing too rapidly, stretching our resources too thin, but since conquering is what the Empire does, any expansionist themes are bound to be well-received.

"For decades now, Jupiter Station has served as the primary staging ground for many of our greatest leaps forward. Our most successful military campaigns, our most lucrative trade caravans and prospecting expeditions, and our most courageous colonists have departed from this place. Hundreds of ships, thousands of people, come and go on a daily basis. We have always been the largest and busiest orbital station in the Empire, and like the Empire itself, we continue to grow and expand, and like the Human race itself, when dealt a crushing blow, we learn from it, build upon it, and push forward.

"So it is with pride and purpose that I am privileged to announce today that we are not rebuilding the Jupiter Station Sickbay. We are building in its place a new and better facility, the Jupiter Station Memorial Research and Teaching Hospital, the Empire's first comprehensive, acute-care, orbital hospital. With two fully-equipped surgical suites, a physiotherapy center, an isolation ward, a cutting-edge laboratory, video-consultation capabilities with any hospital in the quadrant, an intensive-care ward, seven classified research suites, in- and out-patient psychiatric care, confidential addiction recovery services, a sexual health clinic, and a two-cot nursery for expectant civilians who might arrive … unexpectedly…" I pause a moment to let the audience chuckle. "…Jupiter Station Memorial will surpass any planetary facility of the same size.

"This new facility will be a monument to those we have so recently lost, and another leap forward in Humanity's drive to conquer the stars."

I am not the most dynamic speaker, and it was not the most rousing speech, but I get a healthy round of applause, a whistle or two, and a couple of cheers as I thank my audience and step back from the podium. A glance at Commodore Tucker reveals that he is clapping as hard as anybody else, and when I catch his eye, he gives me a wink and a nod. I return the nod and can't help smiling. It seems I have fulfilled his requirements to keep it short and uplifting and not to speak ill of the dead.

Next Minister Bahar calls up Major Crawley and Commodore Tucker to complete the process of transferring jurisdiction of the site from the MACO investigative team to the Corps of Engineers. They already did most of the work ahead of time, the entire transaction being too long and dull for a public performance. The last two minutes of the handover play out almost like wedding vows, with the major sternly asking the commodore a series of questions to which he solemnly replies, "I will…I will…I will." I'm guessing the resemblance isn't lost on them, either, but if either feels the temptation to smile they control it perfectly. I wouldn't be surprised if at some future point there will be a jokey reference to it at one of our planning meetings, but they both know there's a time and a place for everything.

The Empress's speech that follows conveniently echoes the themes of expansion, learning from setbacks, and honoring our dead that I expressed in my own. I won't allow my ego to imagine that her speechwriter drew inspiration from me, but I'm certain the echoing of my ideas is, if not actually intentional, then at least accepted as a happy coincidence. The moment it was decided the Empress would record an address, I was required to send a copy of my speech to the Imperial Director of Communications. If anyone had found a problem with the Empress repeating me I would have been told to change my speech.

When she finishes promoting the mission of Imperial expansion, she announces that a plaque bearing the names of all the humans who perished in the blast will be displayed at the main entrance to Jupiter Station Memorial. She ends by reading aloud the names of the fallen, in descending order of rank and alphabetically within ranks, starting with General Jay 'Alpha' Hayes and ending with Crewman first Class Mirka Vukovic; and if they weren't all heroes in life, they become so in death as their names fall from her lips. The omission of one Doctor Phlox-tunnai-oortann is only obvious to those of us who spent the last year with him lurking about on the station, and frankly, knowing Phlox from his days on Enterprise, even if it weren't suicidal, I doubt anyone would care to object.

She signs off by wishing us well and reminding us that the entire Empire is watching. After the screen fades to black, the high, sweet, lonesome sound of a bosun's whistle trickles into the silence, my cue to wrap things up. I rise from my chair and walk with a solemn, measured pace to Commodore Tucker, who has risen to receive me. He stands comfortably at parade rest waiting for me to reach my mark and fire off a crisp salute. Then he snaps to attention himself, returns the salute, and acknowledges me.

"Commander Kelby?"

"Permission to begin work, sir?"

He takes about three seconds to look at the crowd. I have no doubt this is a calculated dramatic pause for the cameras. When it comes to getting a job done, the man's usually as practical as a hyperspanner, but when circumstances call for it, he can put on a show better than anyone I've ever seen.

"Permission granted," he replies briskly.

I complete a sharp right face, and in my best command voice, something I'm not ashamed to admit I practiced for several minutes in front of the mirror in my quarters, I call, "Engineers, attention!"

Seventy-five people, my entire team, all three shifts, nearly a third of the audience, rise as one, gear in hand.

"You know your mission. You have your orders. Do good work!" I instruct them.

Julie Massaro takes over then. "First team, GO!"

We practiced deploying the crews several times yesterday, and it goes like clockwork now as a dozen or so people from each side of the crowd march down to the front, around the dais, and up to the doors. Two by two, they step over the threshold, quickly don their helmets, goggles, and safety belts – they're already wearing their work gloves as part of their new uniforms – clip onto one of the waiting safety lines, and float off into the cavernous space; the gravity in there won't be switched on until most of the work has been done to get the internal superstructure in place. It's a whole lot easier to position huge slabs of duranium plating when you can turn them with the push of a finger, not to mention the convenience of having floors under your feet.

Already I can hear Marla Moore speaking quietly into her microphone about the precision with which my team moves, "as one would expect from the Imperial Fleet's top engineers". The commodore promised her a live interview so long as she keeps her camera trained on the doors until the last of my people are through in order to give their friends and family back home the thrill of seeing them on television. In our practices it took about seven minutes to get everyone into the work area, a long time for a live camera feed of not much happening, and an eternity of being grilled by a reporter. I'm not sure there is an appropriate way for my team to collectively express their gratitude for such a magnanimous act on his part, but I'll certainly make a point of thanking him on their behalf.

As the broadcast ends and the audience breaks up and returns to their duties, Minister Bahar and Admiral Gardener drift toward Colonel Burnell and Major Crawley for some small talk. With Julie well in charge of deploying the teams, I peel away and head back to my quarters to change into a work coverall. The commodore also promised he'd keep the press off my back today, which, after the crap I pulled last year, is more than I deserve. I think he's doing it because he realizes that, now that I don't want to screw with him anymore, I'm really not comfortable about talking with the press.

I'll have to be sure to thank him for that, too.

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